Sonic Fragments is a sound art festival and symposium exploring how these mediations effect meaning in our lives, and how artists are actively engaging narrative and mediation in their work. We are hoping for a diverse and interdisciplinary dialogue between scholars and artists, between theory and practice.

Our panelists include William Basinski, Jon Brumit, Rubén Gallo, Brenda Hutchinson, Tianna Kennedy, Thomas Y. Levin, Camille Norment, Mendi + Keith Obadike, Kristin Oppenheim, Ed Osborn, Michael Schumacher, and Stephen Vitiello.

Exhibition artists include William Basinski, Betsey Biggs, Jon Brumit, Michael Bullock, Seth Cluett, M.R. Daniel, Michael Early, Brent Fariss, Alan Goodrich, Johanna Hallsten, Brenda Hutchinson, John Kannenberg, Kenneth Kirschner, Leonel Kaplan, Tianna Kennedy, Stephan Moore, Preston Poe, Leah Rico, Jennifer Schmidt, Michael Schumacher, Scott Smallwood, Stephen Spera, Debra Swack, and Samson Young. We hear while we are in the womb, long before we see. For the rest of our lives, hearing essentially precedes the rest of the sensorium, as we move through a world of sonic fragments which affect us phenomenally and emotionally but of which we are often unaware. These fragments are mediated by our environment, our bodies, our individual and collective memories, and the technologies that pervade contemporary life: from books to radio to television to iPods. Through these mediations sounds give rise to stories, which though they might be as hazy as an aura, begin to narrate the world we move through as they themselves move through our bodies and minds.