Lea Kieffer

RADIO WHALES

SUPPORT AND CO-PRODUCTION

Photo Olivier Amato

FESTIVAL Picardie For Ever ( PFE )

5-8 September 2024

Video Documentation Marijn Degenaar / Photos Mari Vass

Hošek Contemporary INSTALLATION AND PERFORMANCES (10 & 17 August 2024)

THE AQUARIUM WORLDWIDE · RADIO WHALES #1 - The tales of Soft Water Whales with Joe Dumit

RADIO WHALES was premiered at Hošek Contemporary on August 10th 2024, fellowed by an other perfomance on August 17th. The exibition was open during the week in between and on August 15th a WHALE JAM took place inviting visitors to join actively and practice whaling themself.On September 6th and 7th, Radio WHlaes will be presented at PFE Fesitval in France.

Radio Whales is co-produced by Fonds Transfabrik - Franco-German fund for theperforming arts and supported by Urban Boat and Picardie For Ever, and is featured in the 2024 Watch me dance campaign by Tanzbüro Berlin.

Léa and Timothée want to give huge thanks to Joe Dumit, Meroë (Sophie Vautour), Zachary Vincent,Stefan Gabercettel and Abigail Sanders.

What if the passing barges and ships on the Spree were mechanical whales,swimming in the soft waters and rivers of our city? What if they can capture the electric vibrations of the songs and stories of the environments through their metallic skin? Get on the water and closer to the carcass of the boat, open your sensors and let‘s tune in RADIO WHALES! – a device to tune with marine mammals and meet our need for interspecies connections.

RADIO WHALES is an improvised dance performance set in an immersive scenography/installation. The piece consists of a dance score, amplified voices, sound piece, sound installation and visual arts (textile and various materials sculptures) in the two spaces of the barge of Hošek Contemporary. Awardees of Hošek Contemporary 2nd Prize 2024, pluri-disciplinary artist's duo Léa Kieffer and Timothée Nay invite Sound artist Jamika Ajalon with the scientific support of Joe Dumit.
RADIO WHALES is a multi sensorial podcast: not only to be listened to, but to be perceived in its spatial arrangement, to be seen, to be touched.

RADIO WHALES tells our separate yet shared stories with marine mammals, opening up an imaginary world of coexistence and designing strategies for our co-dependent survival. Memories of the big Whales hunts as it was often told by the river whales are shared, in a cross dialogue with the research of Joe Dumit, professor of anthropology and science & technology studies at the University of California, Davis.
Listening to RADIO WHALES lets us enter a world of science-fiction narratives in which humans develop their own echolocation devices. to communicate with whales, by setting up radio receptors inside of barges.
To the metaphorical body of whales, RADIO WHALES links the materiality of the metal body of barges, the history of river and inland navigation that they tell us, and their singular situation in the ecological challenges we face today. Evoking two figures that are both historically and emotionally marked - we are carried away by the rêverie that takes hold of us when we see a barge navigating on a river, we share the human affection for whales - RADIO WHALES invites to travel in our imagination and activate our fantasy.