Jacek Smolicki
(born during martial law in Kraków)
is a Stockholm-based cross-disciplinary artist, designer, researcher and educator.
His work explores temporal, existential and technological dimensions
of listening, recording and archiving practices in human and more-than-human realms.
His research spans perspectives from Sound and Media Studies, Media Archaeology, Philosophy of Technology, and Environmental Humanities.
Besides engaging with historical archives, media, and heritage,
Smolicki develops other modes of sensing, recording, and mediating stories and signals from specific sites, scales, and temporalities.
His work is manifested through hybrid soundwalks, soundscape compositions, diverse forms of writing, site-responsive performances, experimental archives,
and audio-visual installations.
He has performed, published, and exhibited internationally (e.g. In-Sonora Madrid, Atlantic Center for the Arts, Moscow International Biennale for Young Art, AudioArt Kraków,
Ars Electronica, Linz, Sonorities, Belfast, and Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo).
His broad range of site-responsive artistic and research activities includes projects concerned with the soundscapes and timescapes of:
Nordic Arctic Circle, (facilitated by Swedish Research Council, Polar Research Secretariat in Abisko, Kilpisjärvi Biological Station and Bioart Society in Helsinki),
Canadian Pacific Coast, (facilitated by New Music Vancouver and Swedish Research Council),
Walden Pond area, (facilitated by Harvard University, Walden Pond State Reservation and Swedish Research Council),
Canaveral seashore, (facilitated by Canaveral National Seashore, US National Park Service and Atlantic Center for the Arts),
World's tallest wooden radio mast in Gliwice, (facilitated by Silesian Metropolitan Network),
The oldest American bells (in collaboration with Bell Ringers Guild and Old North Church in Boston),
Three-Country Cairn, a border point of Sweden, Norway and Finland (facilitated by Bioart Society),
Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University, (facilitated by Arnolds Arboretum),
UFO testimonies (facilitated by the Archives for the Unexplained in Nörrköping),
Former Jewish Ghetto in Kraków, (facilitated by the Jewish Culture Festival and Katarzyna Zimmerer),
Former sites of the Yugoslav Wars (in collaboration with Tim Shaw),
Madrid's busking culture, (facilitated by In-Sonora Madrid 2013),
Swiss soundmarks, (facilitated by ARC artistic residence and Sally de Kunst),
Alfred Nobel's factory complex in Stockholm (as part of Walking Festival of Sound 2021),
Historical artifacts from New York (in collaboration with Museum of Interesting Things in New York),
Söderström, the shortest river in Sweden (facilitated by Riversssounds),
And many other places.
In 2017 he completed his
PhD in Media and Communications from the School of Arts and Communication at Malmö University where he was a member of
Living Archives,
a research project funded by the Swedish Research Council.
Between 2020-2023 Smolicki pursued
an international postdoctoral research funded by the Swedish Research Council.
Located at Linköping University in Sweden, Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada, and Harvard, USA, his research explored the history and prospects of field recording
and soundwalking practices from the perspective of arts, environmental humanities, and philosophy of technology. His edited book 'Soundwalking. Through Time, Space, and Technologies' was
published by Routledge in 2023.
In 2022/2023 he was a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Harvard.
He is currently a researcher at
the Informatics and Media Hub for Digital Existence at Uppsala University and a member of BioMe, a research project that investigates ethical implications of AI technologies on everyday life realms. Smolicki explores
sonic capture cultures and the impact of AI technologies on human and other-than-human voices.
He is a co-founder of Walking Festival of Sound, a transdisciplinary and nomadic
event exploring the critical and reflective role of walking through and listening to our everyday surroundings.
Since 2008 Smolicki has been working on On-Going Project, a systematic experimentation
with various recording techniques and technologies leading to a multifaceted para-archive of contemporary everyday life, culture, and environment.
The On-Going Project includes Minuting, a record of public soundscapes performed daily ever since July 2010, for which
he received the main prize at the Society for Artistic Research conference in 2022.
Contact: jacek[at]smolicki[dot]com,
Selected Performances and Exhibitions
2024
Slip of the Machinic Tongue, sound installation, WeAreHowWeAre/Sound Objects, Fylkingen, Stockholm
Transversal Listening, soundwalk, Alliances and Commonalities, Artistic Research Symposium, Stockholm
Inaudible Cities #3, soundwalk, To)Pot Festival of Radical Soundwalks, Ljubljana
Here, Now, There, and Then, soundwalk, Sonorities, Belfast
Discord MA or Forever on the Alert, multichannel sound installation at Sound as/and Poetry symposium, Uppsala University
2023
Wish We Weren't Here, group exhibition, Studio 44, Stockholm
The Fells, soundwalk performance, BioArt Society, Helsinki
Drifts, hybrid soundwalks with Tim Shaw, group exhibition, Uniarts Research Pavilion, Helsinki
Soundwalking through Time, Space & Technologies, Multichannel soundscape composition & installation, Atlantic Center for the Arts, New Smyrna, Florida
One Step at a Deep Time, soundwalk composition, Canaveral National Seashore & Atlantic Center for the Arts, Florida
Forever on the Alert, Multichannel soundscape performance, Holden Chapel, Harvard University
Unsound Peregrinations, Multichannel soundscape performance, Sonic Lab, SARC, Queen's University, Belfast
Arboreal Sonorities, soundwalks, Arnold Arboretum, Harvard University
2022
E 7 L, performance with Jin Sangtae, WFoS 2022, Box Theater, Seoul Art Space Mullae, New Music Vancouver
Slip of the Machinic Tongue, soundscape composition, installation & performance, Digital Existence III, Sigtuna Foundation
2021
The Lake that Glimmers like Fire, soundwalk & workshop, Färgfabriken
Intertidal Room, 6-channel soundscape composition, Ars Electronica, Linz
Intertidal Room, soundwalk/soundscape installation, 'Unheard Landscapes: Listening, Resonating, Inhabiting,' Blois, France
Söderström, multichannel soundscape composition & soundwalk, Riversssounds commission
Transference, hybrid soundwalk with R.Bautista, T.Shaw & S.Karami, WFoS 2021, Krakow/Edinburgh
2020
Inaudible Cities #2, soundwalking score, group exhibition, Acts of Air, CRiSAP
Per Aspera and Astra, performative soundscape composition with Katt Hernandez, Radio Silence, Fylkingen, Stockholm
2019
Sonic Sensibilities, sound performance and assembly, Posthumanities Hub, Reaktorhallen, Stockholm
Ottilia Adelborg: Assembling the World, exhibition and publication launch, with Malin Pettersson Öberg, Konstakademien, Stockholm
2018
Quivering Stillness, Living Archives, Malmö Museum
Returning the Ear, soundwalk performances with Tim Shaw, InterArts Center, Malmö, Illutron, Copenhagen, Fylkingen, Stockholm
Listening Back, Listening Ahead, soundwalk composition, World Listening Day, Resonance FM
Gagnef Project, sound performance, Gagnef Festival
Ottilia Adelborg: Assembling the World, publication & exhibition, Ottilia Adelborg Museet, Gagnef
Disruptive Witnessing, performance, with Tim Shaw, Truth or Politics, The Concept of Testimony in the Commemoration of the Yugoslav Wars, a group exhibition at Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo, and Volkskundemuseum, Vienna, Austria
2017
Post-Digital Archives, curating a group exhibition, InterArts Center, Malmö
Per Aspera and Astra, performative soundscape composition with Katt Hernandez, Radio Silence, Fylkingen, Stockholm
Fragmentarium Club,soundwalk, World Listening Day, Stockholm
2015
Reality Backup, solo exhibition, Detroit-Stockholm, artist-run gallery, Stockholm
Self-tracking Art, co-curating & exhibiting with Alberto Frigo, Quantified Self, Mason Fort, San Francisco
2014
Streetsampling Madrid, sound performance & installation, Off Limit Gallery, In-Sonora, Madrid
2013
Affexity: Passages and Tunnels, AR performance with S.Kozel, C. Rydd, D.Spikol, J.Ginslov, Re-New Digital Arts Festival, Copenhagen
Hökarängen Project, sound installation, group show Augmented Spatiality, Stockholm
Slussen Project, sound installation, Medborgarplatsen Biblioteket, Stockholm
Slussen Project, sound installation, Musik Museet, Stockholm
Dzielnica 1941-1943, soundwalk composition, Jewish Culture Festival, Kraków
2012
I to Eye, installation, Young Art Biennale, Moscow
2011
Lask Walk of Olof Palme, soundwalk composition, Stockholm
Selected Talks, Presentations and Workshops
2024
Transversal Listening, , Talk at the 20th anniversary of Sound Environment Centre, Lund University
Technologies and Techniques of Deterrent Listening. On Ecotones of Białowieża Forest , Talk at Quiet Urgency: Disturbing Sonic Ecologies, London Design Week, Central Saint Martins & Soncities project
Discord MA or Forever on the Alert, talk at Sound as/and Poetry symposium, Uppsala University
2023
A Walk in the Forest. Ecotonal listening and sonic deterring techniques in human and other-than-human realms, keynote at Beyond Listening: Agency, Art, and the Environment, an International Symposium on Sonic Ecologies, MOME University of Arts and Design, Budapest
Relational Technologies, seminar for New Medical Technologies and Philosophy at Medical College, Jagiellonian University, Kraków
Soundwalking. Through Time, Space, and Technologies, talk at To)Pot Festival of Radical Soundwalks in Ljubljana
Soundwalking through Time, Space, and Technologies, presentation at MetaLab, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
You Never Soundwalk Alone. Transversal and Transformative Potentials of Soundwalking, presentation at World Forum for Acoustic Ecology 2023, Atlantic Center for the Arts, New Smyrna Beach, Florida
Quivering Stillness. On Itinerant Approaches to Composing with Timescapes, open seminar at Sonic Lab, SARC, Queen’s University, Belfast, Northern Ireland
2022
From Soundmarks to Soundscars (and Back), talk at ‘Soundscapes and Social Justice’ symposium, Oxford and Harvard University
Soundwalking Workshops: Arboreal Listening, Ecotonal Listening and Palimpsestic Listening, New Music Vancouver, WFoS 2022, Vancouver
Composing with Soundscapes, workshops, Music Department, Harvard University
Un/soundwalking through Time, Space, and Technologies, talk at Soundwalk Symposium, Electroacoustic Studies, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada (Tiohtià:ke)
2021
Unsound Landscapes, Beastly Soundscapes, performative lecture w/ Girilal Baars, Beastly Landscapes symposium at School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University
Soundwalking through Time, Space, and Technologies workshop at Soundscape Workshop, Moholy-Nagy University of Arts and Design, Budapest/Kőszeg
Where Sea Meets Land. Soundwalking through Unsound fields, presenatation at STREAMS – Transformative Environmental Humanities international conference at KTH, Stockholm
On Listening, Performing, and Participating as Spectral Modes of Arts-based Research,'talk with mirko nikolić at 'Articulations', Swedish Research Council's annual symposium on artistic research.
Rerouting the trails for soundwalking, seminar for CENSE, Central European Network for Sonic Ecologies, online
Living with, against (and in parallel with) Voice Capture Technologies and Practices,' seminar within 'Undisciplined AI Ethics' series, The Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Program – Humanities and Society
History Has its Ears on Us, opening talk at the Walking Festival of Sound, 2021, Kraków, Edinburgh, online
2020
Listening to History: Revisiting Memory through Soundscape Compositions, presentation and conversation with composer Yvette Janine Jackson within a series organized by Goethe Institute in Boston and Monument Lab in Philadelphia
Soundwalking through Inaudible Cities - Peripheral Soundscapes of Stockholm and Beyond, performative lecture, Ecology, Site and Place, Piteå Performing Arts Biennial (online)
From the Impulse to Enliven the Archive towards Alternative Archiving Modalities, paper presented at The Second Life of Recorded Sounds, international conference, Central European Network for Sonic Ecologies (CENSE), Pracownia Audiosfery, Instytut Kulturoznawstwa, Wrocław University, Wrocław, Poland
Intertidal Room – A Soundwalk through Timescapes of Vancouver's Coastline, lecture, New Music Vancouver, Vancouver, BC, Canada
2019
Touching the Radio Tower. Doing Archaeology of Mediations through Artistic Practice presentation at Media Matter: Media Archaeological Research and Artistic Practice, an international conference, Stockholm University, Filmhuset, Stockholm
2018
Cache 22: on Lures and Traps of Digital Memory, talk at To Be Archived, closing event of the Living Archives research project, Malmö Museum
Alienating and Affirmative Agency of Contemporary Mnemotechnologies, talk at Documedial Revolution seminar, Collège d'études mondiales de la FMSH, Paris
Selected Research Projects and Grants
2022-2023 Soundwalking, Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Harvard University, funded by the Fulbright Commission
2020-2023 Soundwalking. The Art of Walking and Listening through Time, Space, and Technologies, funded by the Swedish Research Council, International Postdoc within Artistic Research
2020-2024 BioMe: Existential Challenges and Ethical Imperatives of Biometric AI in Everyday Lifeworlds, funded by the Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Program – Humanity and Society (WASP-HS), led by Prof. Amanda Lagerkvist
2021 Culture of Solidarity Fund, European Cultural Foundation, grant towards Walking Festival of Sound
2013-2017 Para-Archives: Rethinking Personal Archiving Practices in the Times of Capture Culture, part of Living Archives Research Project funded by the Swedish Research Council, PhD studies
Selected Residencies
2023 Kilpisjärvi Biological Station, BioArt Society, Helsinki
2023 Soundscape Field Station, Canaveral National Seashore, Atlantic Center for the Arts, New Smyrna, Florida
2023 Research Pavilion #5, Uniarts, Helsinki, with Tim Shaw and Elena Biserna
2018 Arc Custom Residency, Arc Romainmótier, Switzerland
2018 InterArts Center, with Tim Shaw, Malmö
2017 Cac Ses Voltes, with Ronda Bautista, Palma de Mallorca
2016 Walk & Talk, with Tim Shaw, Arc, Romainmótier, Switzerland
2015 Online Residency, In-Sonora, Madrid