Radio Amnion: Oceanic Listening as Transcendental (t)Ec(n)ology

Workshop and Listening Session with Jol Thoms and Denise Helene Sumi

The Elevate Festival Graz invites to a workshop as part of the Radio Amnion project and sound ritual. In cooperation with Weibel Institute for Digital Cultures at the University of Applied Arts Vienna.
In this workshop, we invite you to learn about the project and sonic ritual Radio Amnion through guided listening exercises and explorations of oceanic compositions by Anne Bourne, Jose Rivera, Margarida Mendes, Antonina Nowacka and others.
Radio Amnion, initiated by Jol Thoms, is a sound art project that commissions contemporary compositions transmitted over 2.5 km deep into the Pacific Ocean, far from human perception, over a submerged neutrino telescope. During each full moon, the abyssal waters of the Cascadia Basin resonate with the deep frequencies and voices of invited artists. 

Radio Amnion regards itself as part of the Earth’s living hydrological cycles and questions the divisions between scientific and artistic forms of knowledge. It asks: What value does knowledge beyond the measurable and quantifiable have or mean, and can sound create intimate relationships with bacteria and energetic cosmic living forces?  What else could sound do?

The workshop requires no prior knowledge and is open to all interested participants. Students and sound artists working with similar formats are encouraged to share works, audio essays, field recordings, or sound compositions in advance that reflect their interest in the living matter and activities on Earth and beyond. The workshop will be held in English with the possibility of translation into German.

The format is realised in collaboration with Weibel Institute for Digital Cultures (University of Applied Arts, Vienna).  


Workshop registration info
Register until 2 März 2026 via denise.sumi@uni-ak.ac.at.

Information
You can find additional information on the website.

Jol Thoms (b. Tkaronto) is an artist, curator and researcher based in London, UK where he is Studio Lecturer on the MA Art & Ecology at Goldsmiths University. His critical practice crosses and reconfigures boundaries between the non/human, cosmological and the scientific using strategies from quantum listening, experimental audio-visual arts, environmental humanities, and anti-colonial feminist science studies. 

Denise Helene Sumi is a PhD candiate at the Weibel Institute for Digital Cultures. Her research examines a set of cultural dynamics and political questions in a world replete with technological connections, engaging with media art history, network cultures, and relationality. She is interested in works that cultivate convivial and relational technologies, alongside intuitive and embodied ways of transmitting, knowing, and sensing.

Event
Workshop
05. March 2026, 12:00 - 15:00
Heimatsaal, Paulustorgasse 13a, 8010 Graz