With the financial support of the EFFEA (European Festivals Fund for Emerging Artists) initiative, and in the program collaboration with the festivals of new music, electronics, electroacoustics, avant-garde jazz, etc. the Ring ring festival (Serbia) and the 180° – Laboratory for Innovative Art (Bulgaria), there will be a three-day resident appearance of the IRK Electroacoustic Ensemble at the 2023 MBZ. The concept of the Performing Reflection project of double bassist Ivar Roban Križić will include open rehearsals and a final performance at the MBZ. The final product, the performance itself, without open rehearsals, will be presented at two partner festivals as well.
The ensemble consisting of regional and international participants will perform improvisations at the Močvara Club on instruments such as double bass, trumpet and recorder, as well as electronics. The German philosopher Christian Grüny, an expert in the philosophy of music, phenomenology and aesthetics, will also take part in the project by performing improvised verbal philosophical interpretations as the ensemble plays.
The goal of this project is to blur the lines between performance, workshop and lecture while demystifying the art of improvisation together with all its preparatory processes. By opening their intimate performance space to an audience with different levels of prior knowledge and to the local community in general, the artists will try to create, as they say, an open platform for discussion and performance, namely a space for co-production, reflection and dealing with various theoretical and practical aspects of free improvisation. In this context, the audience is free to do whatever it wants: ask the musicians questions, participate in the discussion or, for example, play the music themselves. The artists also point out a number of key questions that dominate the performance setting, such as: "How does the meaning of the term ‘improvisation’ differ from one artistic domain to another?" or "How does the improvisational production of meaning and knowledge provide models for new forms of social mobilization that bring action, personality and diversity to the forefront?"
Additionally, the collaborative approach between music and philosophy is used to establish a connection between the performative and contemplative states in which artists find themselves. In other words, they want to facilitate contemplation and discussion about creation while they are creating and allow contemplation to then influence the direction of musical improvisation and the types of reactions of the audience. Finally, they will attempt to observe various modes of cognitive functioning during such a transdisciplinary artistic act.
Despite the many questions raised about improvisation, the focus will not necessarily be on their immediate resolution, but rather on encouraging the community to continue dealing with them in a transdisciplinary context.
Ivar Roban Križić, double bass
Pavle Jovanović, guitar, effects
Nikola Vuković, trumpet
Luka Zabric, alto saxophone
Urban Megušar, cello
Bojan Krhlanko, drum set, percussion, electronics
Christine Gnigler, recorder
Thomas Grill, electronics
Christian Grüny, theory/philosophy
program collaboration with the ring ring festival and 180° –laboratory for innovative art
with the support of the EFFEA program
