As part of the context programme’s track Instrumental Ecologies, artists and composers Ellen Fullman and Pak Yan Lau will enter into a conversation on listening and sounding mediated by their self-built or assembled instruments. The artists share a deep interest in working with acoustics, vibration, and overtones, and in seeing how our modes of listening and being attentive to sound transform throughout time. Fullman will speak more about building, composing, and performing with The Long String Instrument, an installation of dozens of tuned strings which have resonated in architectural spaces across the world. Pak Yan will walk us through her electro-acoustic sound universe, with its prepared pianos, toy pianos, synths, electronics, and various sound objects, producing immersive sound palettes, overtones, and harmonics.

Ellen Fullman will perform Elemental View with the experimental chamber music ensemble The Living Earth Show at The Hague’s Nieuwe Kerk on Friday 7 April. Pak Yan Lau will perform a live rendition of her recent album Bakunawa alongside her ensemble on Sunday 9 April.