Wan ZHAO
The Observer
"The Observer" is an interactive, generative audiovisual performance inspired by quantum mechanics. In quantum physics, a system exists in a chaotic "superposition" of all possible states until it is observed, at which point it collapses into a single, definite reality. This performance translates that phenomenon directly into a real-time A/V experience.
When the system is "unobserved," the environment is immersed, and the audio are time-stretched into a deep, heavy, and unrecognizable reverberating drone, while the visual projection displays a chaotic, drifting cloud of digital particles.
The core of the performance relies on the QAC toolkit. The moment the performer looks directly into the camera, the act of "observation" forces the system to measure a simulated quantum circuit. Instantly, the wave function collapses: the chaotic point cloud smoothly morphs into a ordered 3D sphere pulsating to the beat, and the ambient drone snaps into a clear, recognizable audio sample chosen by the quantum algorithm. By blurring the lines between the generative system and human presence, the piece makes the simple act of "looking" a powerful musical instrument.
Wenqi WU
botanica++
Botanica++ is a live performance that combines the human voice, embodied movement, and wearable hardware. It is inspired by an emerging music genre called Botanica. In this work, I use extensive granular synthesis to shape the musical texture, while exploring how to balance artistic impact, imagination, creativity, intuitive and accessible performance interaction, and my personal musical aesthetics and expression.
Lingxiao HAN
"雷击木"(Lightning-struck wood)
"Lightning-stuck wood" is an interactive multimedia performance that uses the natural phenomenon of lightning-struck wood as a medium to explore the latent connections between traditional Chinese Taoist philosophy and quantum mechanics.
Jiayi LIU
What's in my mind?
This work explores the internal state of an ADHD mind, transforming a personal cognitive experience into an interactive electroacoustic soundscape. The piece reflects a constantly shifting mental environment—brief moments of focus, disappearing thoughts, forgetfulness, and a persistent sense of restlessness.
The sonic material is built from fragmented gestures, glitches, and short looping structures, with sharp contrasts in density and frequency. In this stereo version, spatial movement is rendered through rapid shifts in balance and layering, suggesting the instability and unpredictability of thought.
Using real-time processing in Max and gesture-based control, bodily movement influences the behavior of sound. However, the system remains partially unstable, incorporating elements of randomness. Sudden or irregular gestures may trigger interruptions or introduce new fragments, reflecting a lack of full control.
The result is an evolving sonic space characterized by repetition, disruption, and abrupt change—an attempt to render audible the experience of a mind that cannot settle.
Qianwen ZHANG
Lithic Reverie
This performance integrates real time sonified audio and recorded samples from construction site. The installation structure is inspired from Chinese traditional stone chime, which produce heavenly sound by tapping each delicately carved stone. While in this work, the "stone" was retrieved from the construction site. They are actually concrete which is an integration of natural stone elements and manmade processes, possessing intertwined memories of both the deep geological time and human industrial time. The scaffolding structure is not just a frame for hanging the stone, it is also a vital part of the installation. They are constructed when buildings are required, materially enabling urbanization. But they forever remain as temporarily existed. They can never stay as a finished architecture, as a landmark in the city as they helped built.
This work addresses extractivism not only as a geological or ecological process, but also as a cultural, epistemic, and ontological one, through which identities, knowledge, and values are extracted. Concrete and scaffolding structures from construction site stand as one representative material among many, while countless other materials, subjects, and entities are experiencing the similar extracting process.
Hao LI
Five Elements (Wuxing)
This piece explores a spatial audiovisual approach in which sound, visual form, interaction, and space are treated as a unified system. In a mixed reality environment, spatial audiovisual objects function as both sound sources and visual entities that can be arranged and manipulated through embodied interaction.
The performance is structured around five objects representing the Wuxing system in Chinese philosophy, commonly translated as the Five Elements or Five Phases: wood, fire, earth, metal, and water. Each object's sonic and visual qualities reflect its element, while their interactions follow the generative and destructive cycles described in the Wuxing system.
Through this approach, the work investigates how interaction and space can become additional dimensions in audiovisual performance, while reflecting ideas of transformation, balance, and harmony in Chinese philosophy.
Jessie Yujie LIU
A Heap of Broken Images
A Heap of Broken Images is a live audiovisual performance inspired by Imagist poetry and its emphasis on the arrangement of images. The piece explores how fragments of language can be represented into sound, image, and atmosphere. In the performance, a poem is written live and gradually appears on screen. Certain words trigger ambient sound samples, allowing them to become more than written signs: words turn into sonic layers, visual traces, and broken memories.
Fabian Wangsa SAPUTRA
Shénme - Musique concrète
SHENME?! . . . . Is what you guys are gonna be saying after this.
And, Musique concrète, is just a fancy way of saying "Music from everyday sound"
In this performance, everything you hear is recorded from a PHONE!
Siyi ZHOU
The Last Frequency
"The Last Frequency" is an interactive narrative game demo built with Max and Python, centered around a single-knob radio tuning mechanic. Set against a desolate snowy ambiance, players must navigate through heavy radio static, distorted noises, and muffled audio to lock onto the correct frequencies. Finding and holding the right channel clears the signal, seamlessly unlocking sequential narrative voice chapters along with a haunting, persistent guitar soundscape. It is an atmospheric five-minute journey of listening and piecing the truth together. Yet, when the final transmission ends, the wind dies down, and the screen descends into an eerie, glitching darkness... is the ending really what you think it is?
Alexander BIE
Sonic Disaster
In this performance I venture down self-proclaimed uncharted sonic territory, with each bloop unveiling a new bleep. Beyond the bleeps and the bloops this "Sonic Disaster" peaks as I drag my voice through a mangling device and turn it into something unholy. I hope you leave thinking: "why would somebody do this", with a side dish of "that was kind of cool."