CESSE Conference / Artist, researcher / Hungarian University of Fine Arts, DLA / Budapest / Paper: WHAT/WHY/HOW SHOULD THEY LISTEN? / 15:20-15:40 / 01.12.2018

I am a Hungarian interdisciplinary artist based in Budapest. I work with sound art, performance, composition and improvisation. I hold an Mmus in Interdisciplinary Composition from Goldsmiths College, London and an MA in Sociology from ELTE, Budapest.

In my artistic practice I am creating theatrical/performative experinces exploring the relations of the physical, the social and personal space. I am interested in the small, important moments of non-verbal human interactions.

I compose situations which offer a complex, non-repeating outcome from simple elements, structures and instructions. In many of my work I use portable sound sources to highlight the aspects of the relationship between sound, space and body, and to create an immersive environment without spatial separation between the performance and the audience.

I often work in a site-specific context. I created performances, installations and interventions in foot tunnels, underground stations, a forest, a swimming boat, a Turkish bath, abandoned offices, a mining museum, a synagogue garden, private flats and various other public spaces. In 2017 I was curating the site-specific performances of the Kolorádó Festival, 4 site-specific concerts for Budapest based experimental series Jazzaj.

My work was performed in international festivals in Europe and South America such as Festival d’Avignon (FR), FIME Sao Paolo (BR), Immersive Hubs (NL), Sonorities (NIR) CROSS Awards (IT) We Are Now (UK), NOW’16 (UK), Audiograft (UK), Montag Modus (GER), Let Me In (GER), PureGold (UK) Resolution14 (UK), Stockton Riverside Festival (UK), Miramiro (BE), Divadelni Flora (CZ), UH Festival (HU), L1 Dance Festival (HU), Reality Research Festival (HU), Open Festival (HU) and was supported and commissioned by Oxford Contemporary Music, Arts Council England, The Yard Theatre, Trafó House, Placcc Festival, Theatre Delicatessen, Collegium Hungaricum, Aberdeen City Council, Brighton Dome, Goldsmiths College, Wimbledon College of Art, Minirig Speakers. 

As a collaborator I worked extensively with internationally renowened choreographers such as Claudia Triozzi, Imre Vass (ex-UltimaVez), Zsuzsa Rozsavolgyi (ex-Rosas), Dragana Alfirevic (NomadDanceAcademy), Ivan Mijacevic, Alexandra Baybutt and Rita Góbi. As an improviser I played with musicians such as Vitor Rua, Julie Kjaer, Lawrence Williams, András Wahorn, Béla Ágoston, Ernő Hock, Áron Porteleki and Veronika Harcsa.  http://davidsomlo.com/

(Photo: Attila Károly Nagy)