matralab - Concordia
matralab is a research space of inter-x art directed by Sandeep Bhagwati at Concordia University in Montréal. We are dedicated to using interdisciplinary art practice to bridge the gap between emerging art forms and their aesthetic reflection.
Their research is leading to the establishment of a practical and theoretical framework for the creation and evaluation of interdisciplinary, intercultural, intermedia and interactive art.
http://matralab.hexagram.ca
Sandeep Bhagwati
Project Supervisor
Sandeep Bhagwati is a multiple awardwinning composer, theatre director and media artist. He studied at Mozarteum Salzburg (Austria), Institut de Coordination Acoustique/Musique IRCAM Paris (France) and graduated with a Diplom in Composition from Hochschule für Musik und Theater München (Germany) His compositions and comprovisations in all genres (including 6 operas) have been performed by leading performers at leading venues and festivals worldwide. He has directed international music festivals and intercultural exchange projects with Indian and Chinese musicians and leading new music ensembles. He was a Professor of Composition at Karlsruhe Music University, and Composer-in-Residence at the IRCAM Paris, ZKM Center for Arts and Media Karlsruhe, Beethoven Orchestra Bonn, Institute for Electronic Music Graz, CalArts Los Angeles, Heidelberg University and Tchaikovsky Conservatory Moscow. He also was a guest professor at Heidelberg University in 2009 and has been invited as a visiting research fellow to the University of Arts Berlin in 2013/14.
As Canada Research Chair for Inter-X Arts at Concordia University Montréal since 2006 he currently directs matralab, a research/creation center for intercultural and interdisciplinary arts. His current work centers on comprovisation, intertraditional aesthetics, the aesthetics of interdisciplinarity, gestural theatre, sonic theatre and interactive visual and nonvisual scores. From 2008 to 2011, he also was the director of Hexagram Concordia, a centre for research-creation in media arts with a faculty of 45 artist-researchers and extensive state-of-the-art facilities. Since 2013, he also is the artistic director and conductor of Ensemble Extrakte Berlin.
Travis West
Hardware / Software
http://traviswest.ca/
Sylvain Payen
(TAG) Game development
Sylvain Payen is a game Designer and PhD student in INDI Program with TAG. His thesis works revolves around the engendering of emotions in video game especially within ludic situations and without strong narrative context. Prior to beginning his doctorate he worked in serious games industry and held a BA in Computer science from Paris-XI and an MA in Video Game Design from ENJMIN (FR). During this time he was awarded prizes for his video games – Avenue de l’école de Joinville and Coeur. In his free time he continues to create indie game with the collective – Iterative Deepening.
Felix Del Tredici
Research Associate
The New York Times has described Felix Del Tredici as an “extraordinarily versatile trombonist” whose performances are “disturbing yet fascinating” and “hair-raisingly virtuosic”.
He has performed with Ensemble Signal, Musikfabrik, Fonema Consort, No Hay Banda, Klangforum Wien, Kollektiv Totem, The Hong Kong New Music Ensemble, and the Lucerne Festival Academy. He has been lucky enough to blow his horn in many different contexts through Finland, Hong Kong, Greece, Switzerland, Central Europe, USA, Mexico, and his home: Canada.
He studied at the Schulich School of Music, and for a brief time at the Musik-Akademie Basel. His teachers and mentors include David Taylor, Pierre Beaudry, Mike Wilson, Dave Martin, and Mike Svoboda.
His personal work centers around improvisation and the theatre of daily life.
Jen Reimer
Project Coordinator
Jen Reimer is a sound artist and performer based in Montréal. Her work explores urban soundscapes and resonant spaces through site-specific composition, performances and installations. She has curated and presented her work in numerous abandoned and public spaces in Montréal and abroad. She received a Bachelor of Music in composition and performance from the University of Alberta, a Graduate Diploma in music performance studies from Concordia University in Montréal
Adam Basanta
Research Associate
Adam Basanta is a composer and media artist, whose work traverses electroacoustic, acoustic and mixed composition, audiovisual installations, and interactive laptop performance. His work often explores aspects of listening, cross-modal perception, unorthodox performance practices, and the articulation of site and space.
He holds a BFA from Simon Fraser University, where he studied extensively with Barry Truax, and is currently an MA candidate at Concordia University, supervised by Sandeep Bhagwati and Chris Salter.
Csenge Kolozsvari
Research Associate
Csenge Kolozsvari is an interdisciplinary artist exploring the embodied relationship between thought, movement and sound through the process of change – a transformation by repetition. Through the materiality of sound and movement and the performativity of mundane aesthetic choices (plastic sheets, toys, human bodies, ropes, elevators, aquarium, etc.) she creates multisensory pieces that propose ‘durational escape routes’ for thinking and acting differently.
Her artworks have been exhibited internationally, most recently at Eastern Bloc, Institute of Contemporary Art, Dunaujvaros, (2017) OFF Biennale I-II. Budapest (2016, 2017) the Darling Foundry, University of Amsterdam, (2016), MFA Gallery,The University of Melbourne (2015), FOFA Gallery, Futura Prague (2014). She has participated in residencies across Europe and is the recipient of awards including the National Cultural Fund of Hungary Award, the Stanley Mills Memorial Foundation Fellowship, the Eötvös Hungarian National Scholarship, the Concordia Merit Scholarship, the Carolyn and Richard Renaud Teaching Assistantship Award and the Student grant – SSHRC Partnership Grant ”Immediations” and Step Beyond Travel Grant from the European Cultural Foundation.
She is also part of the Senselab, a laboratory for thought in motion. Here, she is participating in the process-based research-creation at the crossroads of philosophy, art, and activism, focusing on embodied relational movement and emergent collectivities.
Joseph Browne
Software Development
Joseph Browne is a musician, composer, and new media artist based in Montreal.
His work encompasses: sound design for theatre and film, audio production, interactive design, computer music and performance.
Julian Stein
Software Development
Julian Stein is a composer and sound artist currently residing in Montréal, QC. His work often explores musical applications of the everyday with a large focus on intuition and present-experience. Exploring both composed and realtime environments, his work has ranged from multichannel composition and theatre sound-design to collaborative performance and kinetic sound installation. In specific, his work is interested by methods of audio-visual synchronization, phonetics, animal communication, and the urban environment.
Input Devices and Music Interaction Laboratory (IDMIL) - McGill
The Input Devices and Music Interaction Laboratory (IDMIL) was established in March 2005. The IDMIL is affiliated with the Music Technology Area of the Schulich School of Music at McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
The laboratory deals with projects related to the topic of human-computer interaction, the design of musical instruments and interfaces for musical expression, movement data collection and analysis, sensor development, and gestural control.
http://www.idmil.org/
Marcelo M. Wanderley
Supervisor, Haptics & Hardware/Software
Marcelo Mortensen Wanderley holds a Ph.D. degree from the Université Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris VI), France, on acoustics, signal processing, and computer science applied to music. His main research interests include gestural control of sound synthesis, input device design and evaluation, and the use of sensors and actuators in digital musical instruments. Dr. Wanderley has chaired 2003 International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression and co-authored the textbook “New Digital Musical Instruments: Control and Interaction Beyond the Keyboard”, A-R Editions. He is currently William Dawson Scholar and Associate Professor in Music Technology at the Schulich School of Music, McGill University, Montreal, where he directs the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Music Media and Technology (CIRMMT).
Deborah Egloff
Hardware/Software, Haptics Research
Deborah Egloff holds Dual Bachelor Degrees in Music Business and Music Synthesis from Berklee College of Music and a Master of Science in Architectural Sciences (Acoustics Major) from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Egloff’s professional background as a recording engineer and film score composer, and her profound interest in neuro-computational correlates of music cognition and perception, led her towards a métier involving Audio-Haptics and Human Computer Interaction. She is a Ph.D. student in Music Technology at McGill University working with Dr. Marcelo Wanderley in the Input Devices and Music Interaction Laboratory (IDMIL). Her interests include psychoacoustics, vibrotactile music parameters, sensors and converters, and biosignal processing.
Egloff functioned in several engineering, design and development projects. Her artistic work encompasses sound-sculptures, live performances involving composed and improvised pieces for computer, hand-made circuits, and modified electronic and acoustic instruments.
John Sullivan
Hardware/Software, Haptics Research
Johnny is an artist and researcher whose work combines elements of sound synthesis, multimedia installation, web development. Currently completing his MFA in Intermedia at the University of Maine, his studies have led him into user interface design and the study of Human Computer Interaction, which he leverages to create interactive systems both large and small. For the 2014-2015 academic year Johnny has been awarded the University of Maine Graduate School’s Chase Distinguished Research Assistantship. He will spend the year at McGill University in Montreal as a Graduate Research Trainee, conducting his thesis research designing new digital musical instruments and interfaces at the Input Devices and Music Interaction Laboratory in Montreal under the direction of Marcelo Wanderley.
XS Lab - Concordia
XS Labs is a design research studio with a focus on innovation in the fields of electronic textiles and reactive garments: “second skins” that can enable computationally-mediated interactions with the environment and the individual. We are equally inspired by the technical and cultural history of how textiles have been made for generations (weaving, stitching, embroidery, knitting, beading, quilting) and by new and emerging materials with different electro-mechanical properties. This enables us to construct complex textile-based surfaces, substrates, and structures with "transitive" properties.
http://www.xslabs.net/
Joanna Berzowska
Supervisor, Textiles & Wearable Technology
Joanna Berzowska is Associate Professor of Design and Computation Arts at Concordia University and a member of the Hexagram Research Institute in Montreal. She is the founder and research director of XS Labs, where her team develops innovative methods and applications in electronic textiles and responsive garments. Her art and design work has been shown in the Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum in NYC, the V&A in London, the Millenium Museum in Beijing, various SIGGRAPH Art Galleries, ISEA, the Art Directors Club in NYC, the Australian Museum in Sydney, NTT ICC in Tokyo, and Ars Electronica Center in Linz among others. She lectures internationally about the field of electronic textiles and related social, cultural, aesthetic, and political issues. She was selected for the Maclean’s 2006 Honour Roll as one of “thirty nine Canadians who make the world a better place to live in”. She received her Masters of Science from MIT and worked with the Tangible Media Group of the MIT Media Lab before co-founding International Fashion Machines in Boston.
Alexandra Bachmayer
Textiles & Wearable Technology Development
Alexandra Bachmayer is a multidisciplinary artist and researcher based in Montréal. She’s currently a research assistant at XS Labs and works under the supervision of Joanna Berzowska to experiment and innovate in the fields of electronic textiles and wearable technology.
She received a Bachelor of Science in Psychology and Environmental Science from McGill University, is currently completing her BFA in Computation Arts at Concordia University, and is an active member of the Textiles and Materiality Research Cluster at Concordia.
Music Performance and Body Lab (MPBL) - McGill
MPBL studies use the scientific approach to develop a thorough understanding of the performer’s control parameters, namely the respiratory mechanics of musicians in order to develop new and improved student-centered science-based pedagogies that will allow students to develop efficient and healthy breathing strategies and other body related practices.
MPBL is a respiratory laboratory with an optoelectronic plethysmograph (motion capture) and respiratory and physiological measurement devices (spirometry, electromyography, flowmeter, pressure and sound recording).
Isabelle Cossette
Supervisor, Music Education
Isabelle Cossette’s qualifications (flute performance degrees & postdoctoral studies on respiratory mechanics) and research interests (respiratory mechanics, music performance enhancement, biomechanics & instrumental pedagogy) as well as her work with world leading respiratory physiologist (Macklem) and international researchers in bioengineering (Aliverti – Italy), acoustics (Fabre – France) and computer sciences (Thorpe – New Zealand) give her unique competencies to conduct scientific experiments based on concerns of musicians and to ‘bridge’ knowledge between the scientific and musical fields. This rare skill is essential to the multidisciplinary research at the basis of new scientifically based instrumental pedagogy.
Thanks to a CFI New Opportunity grant (2005), she is the founder and director of the Music Performance and Body Lab (MPBL), first North American respiratory laboratory using optoelectronic plethysmography (OEP), located at the Schulich School of Music of McGill University. This infrastructure and her international collaborations have led her to train research graduate and visiting students (over 15) and establish appropriate methods (OEP, ultrasound) for the study of areas such as the performer-instrument interaction, musicians’ respiratory mechanics, performance anxiety, posture and gestures.
