I Prefer To Travel is commissioned by BAC in the framework of Micro-commissions no.4: The Bridge Cuts Ever So Close to My Balcony with the support of 21dB

I Prefer to Travel

“it…feels like something from another life…” is a track that was composed for "Expanded Turn"; a project developed by sound artists Nour Sokhon (Beirut, Lebanon) and Jilliene Sellner (Hastings, UK) that explores the universality of sonic realities unfolding during the Corona Pandemic. They juxtapose the experiences of geographically distant people and places through different research methods. By collecting interviews, sonic and visual experiences, Sokhon and Sellner bring to life cultural assumptions, prejudices, understandings and commonalities. The research material is translated into a soundwalk, sound installation and video, a commissioned collection of works for Neue Kunstraum (NKR). The project would have not been possible without the anonymous contributors who shared with us their words, photos and videos. 

Sound Mixing and Mastering: Ziad Moukarzel
Idea and organisation: Detlef Klepsch und Anne Schülke
Photos: Johannes Bendzulla

it…feels like something from another life… Nour Sokhon & Jilliene Sellner

"Beirut in 1 minute" a commission by AGYA.
The soundscape was played with other sounds from Berlin, Cairo, Tunis, and Kuwait City. At the audio station in front of AGYA in Berlin, the city sounds were visualized by their corresponding waves in 3-D prints. The exhibit was produced in the FabLab of the Helmut-Schmidt-Universität in Hamburg. AGYA member Dr. Sonja Buxbaum-Conradi supervised the conversion of the 2D waves into a 3-D modell and conducted the print of the object with her team at the FabLab.

Beirut in 1 minute

“Woman Like a Sea” and “What Happens by the Lighthouse” are soundtrack excerpts from “Eating the Copper Apple” a tale of identity written by @LisaLuxx. Shaped by her life, it weaves together politics and dreams, loss and fulfilment into a one-woman verse play that explores adoption and mixed-heritage. Taking audiences on a voyage from West Yorkshire to the borders of Syria through family, romance and culture, it asks a big question: how do we become who we are? Both funny and philosophical, this profound piece of theatre examines the immense impact of displacement on our sense of self. 

A (sound) map of consciousness was developed by myself and @lisaluxx.  In Eating the Copper Apple each motif was characterised by a certain sound in the composition, creating a dialogue between the written and the sonic languages that deepened the subconscious space.

This collaborative project spearheaded by Luxx (writer, director, performer) brings together a team of Arab women artists: Nour Sokhon (composer), Tamara Al-Mashouk (visual designer), Diyan Zora (dramaturg), @Scarlett Saad (sound engineer) @redboothstudio, and Alia Alzougbi (producer).
This show was developed and commissioned by Liverpool Arab Arts Festival, and funded by the Al-Omar family and Arts Council England.

Woman Like a Sea - soundtrack excerpt from Eating The Copper Apple

What Happens by the Lighthouse_soundtrack excerpt from Eating The Copper Apple

Voyaging Through Silent Rumbles, is the continuation of Vocal Bodies. The latter is an 8 min soundscape which explores the relationship between abandoned spaces and women’s voices that have been affected by human made catastrophes. Silent screams are a constant active presence which accompany our daily lives in Beirut. One layer at a time Voyaging Through Silent Rumbles is a collaborative improvisation with classical musicians which explores our bodies' reactions to facing this normalized state of violence in which we are embedded.

It was an honor to have been given the opportunity to collaborate with Ensemble Modern on this project.

Voyaging Through Silent Rumbles_Excerpt

“I Still Remember” is part of a sound installation with Mad Time Warp curated by Joey Cannizzaro and Ramya Patnaik. It is a looping playlist that features sound artists whose work resists linear clock time; evokes hypnotic, trance, or dreams states; and opens up alternative temporal realities beyond the white, straight, & abled paradigms that constrain and suppress us.

Mad Time Warp is a  part of Party Office’s project ‘Queer Time: Kinships &  Architectures’ at @documentafifteen.

You can experience it at the PO installation at WH22 | 28th June- 25th Sept, 2022.

featuring

Alice Z Jones / That Silent Language (Prelude 2)

Caius / ambient soundscape
XX RAMYA XX / Cryofonicx 6
Liew Niyomkarn / After Hours
Ky Amistad / Out the Corner of Your Eye
Kintrala / Wiwowiwowiwonk

HYENAZ feat. Yusuph Suso / Ex Situ

Johanna Hedva / Mary (god is an asphyxiating black sauce) 
Lain Iwakura / Mäandern
Syd Lewin / Porifera Utopia Now!
librāh / A light
kid death / far party
Libra / The Wind Before the Abyss
Christopher Cole / the desublimation of bowling advice
Alcide Breaux / Listen to Your Heart (Doppler)
Sanni Est / Self-Abolition
Dana Lorenz /  Re_Writing Gaze (Lisa)
Vamp Acid / Altered Fragments
Sophie Hoyle / Hyperacusis
Cedric Tai / Playing a game on my ipad
Iszlai / Spiral
Ps1 Fever Dream / Galaxy Discoveries
Prerit Jain / You do not sleep alone
Nour Sokhon / I still remember

I Still Remember

Lebanon's recent history witnessed a series of traumatic events that drastically affected the country on a societal, and economical level. This resulted in a new Beirut, that is visually dark at night, and sonically less diverse. The cars that pass with their loud music are no longer heard, the chatter of drunken youth moving in Mar Mikhael has disappeared, along with some iconic buildings. Vocal Bodies is an 8 min soundscape which explores the relationship between abandoned spaces, and women’s voices, that have been affected by catastrophes, such as The Revolution, The Pandemic and The Beirut Port Blast. A site specific intervention was held in June 2021, gathering 7 Arab women from different backgrounds (ages 25-50) based in Beirut, to a historically layered location. Vocal Bodies explores their personal stories, and how Lebanon's recent events have impacted them. 
Transcription excerpts: 
“ We have to make use of our space and its efficiency. How a person lives in it as well. And also sitting as one family in a room reminds me of my past. When a space disappears you cannot relate to the… I mean even your memory disappears with it.” 
“Violence is rooted in how people are dealing with their ideals. Because these are ideals, when we say solid, for us to be solid, we are tied to a system that really requires us to have self-awareness. When we are denying what we lived and are hiding it, we are accentuating the trauma. I didn’t even debate this destruction because in my opinion it's safe even though it is destruction.”
Project Director, Composer & Photographer: Nour Sokhon Production Manager: Layane El Hajjar | Production Assistant: Marie-Joëlle Courson | Sound Recordist: Tania Kammoun | Mediator: May ObeidMixing & Mastering: Redbooth Studio |   The work was commissioned by Irtijal in the frame of ISTIMRAR series.

Vocal Bodies

“Of course I hold onto the memories. If you don't acknowledge your past, you won't have a present. I don't try to disconnect.” 
Anonymous - location Leipzig

Nour Sokhon (Beirut, Lebanon) and Elisabeth Liselotte Kraus (Leipzig, Germany) explore the sensorial connections and associations individuals have with their places of origin and how it affects their sense of belonging. Both artists collected research material in the form of interviews, field recordings, photographs, and objects from Beirut, Berlin and Leipzig. The outcome of the research has led them to realize that flight mode/airplane mode is a state that can only be enabled for an immigrant or a refugee when they are fleeing but not when they arrive at their stop, or final location. 

An interdisciplinary output of the research gathered from November 2021- March 2022 captures a moment from the ongoing dialogues about alienation and integration in a foreign land. The research of the project was funded by the Goethe Support Fund Weaving Ties, which aims for artists, collectives and independent cultural professionals to promote international networks and dialogues.

FlightMode_DistantDivides_soundinstallation

A guided audio tour along the shores of the fictional island state of Neutralia. A tour guide speaks through headphones, introducing visitors to the history of this nation state which withdrew from the global system decades ago, a move towards protectionism which would save its people from the looming climate and energy crises. 
Neutralia has since prospered, developing new sustainable technologies including offshore wind farms that allow it to be self-sufficient, and a revival of popular culture that knits together its society. However, these gains came at a cost to some. 
Voyage to Neutralia is a speculative fiction for a limited audience that takes place on a guided walk along Whitstable’s coastline. The work reflects on our shared crises and solutions, on what might be inevitable or avoidable, and what kind of a future we want to build together. 
The work has been developed by Olivia Furber with dramaturg Ramzi Maqdisi and features sound design by Nour Sokhon, sound mix by Ziad Moukarzel, and voiceover by Caroline Faber.

Voyage to Neutralia_ Soundtrack_Excerpt

Drawing inspiration from the ruins of the statue of the goddess Athena as signs of memory and traces of oblivion, the sound installation Sites of Repair represents a "sonic symphony", in which field recordings, and recorded material are harmoniously juxtaposed with musical compositions, pauses, fragmentary narratives of individual and collective traumas, transforming the landscape around the ruins of the Statue of Liberty into a palimpsest of symphonies.

The work was funded by the Municipality of Chania and the Center of Mediterranean Architecture as part of the program “Open Sails”.

Location: Venizelos Tombs, Chania, Crete

Curation: Katerina Gnafaki
Photo documentation: Michalis Gonalakis

Participating artists: Alexandra Epitheti, Nour Sokhon, Evangelia Christakou

Louder than words_Sites of Repair (sound installation)

Sargasso Sea is an ongoing artistic research and poetic engagement with life and death in the ocean, with processes of destruction and regeneration. In the second part Sargasso Sea #2 – Aquariumthe audience is invited to dive through different aquatic landscapes together with the performers over a period of four hours. In a walk-in aquarium, we encounter bleached-out coral reefs that can only be saved by Medusa's vengeance. We stumble over the regrowing body of the sea snail Elysia, let ourselves be captivated by the songs of the sirens and get tangled up in a carpet of algae in the middle of the North Atlantic. Surrounded by these creatures, a thoughtful essay unfolds about our interconnectedness with other life forms, about loss and maritime wonders.

Initiated by Heike Bröckerhoff

By and with Moritz Frischkorn, Ilona Klein, Ben Nurgenç, Benjamin Petersen, Anibal dos Santos, Nour Sokhon and other artistic contributions from the secret agency, Kerstin Möller and more.

Sargasso Sea 2_ Aquarium_Live performance excerpt

Live at Morphine Raum January 2023. 
Recorded By Rabih Beaini

“In a sense, I felt like I was forced to leave, especially after building myself a foundation of friends and connections in Lebanon,” said Ezzedine.
Beirut Today, Sandra Abdelbaki - November 8, 2021

Sunday lunches with the family have turned into whatsapp video calls, with every member in a different location. Dinner gatherings with friends have turned into photo exchanges of longing, where we begin to make plans to meet in Lebanon or somewhere that doesn’t require a visa. 

As immigration continues to grow in Lebanon, I begin to wonder what will the future look like? Will the country find its way back or more importantly will the people find their way back to the country? The notion of a collective future becomes challenging to imagine as the exodus continues to grow. The sonic journey is dedicated to the mass number of people around the globe that have had to leave their home, yet continue to find themselves drifting between two places and spaces. “And who are we now?”  is an ongoing research, it continues to shift and transform itself, its growth is affected by personal and global upheavals. The performance in itself is an act of mourning, inviting listeners to take part in this collective moment.

And who are we now?

Sneak preview of what will be played on the next Tse Tse Fly Middle East Event  (Friday, January 8, 2016) in Dubai

Nour Sokhn- Untitled 2015 (Simon Coates Remix)

Nour Sokhon - Forest Frequencies

Audio loop I created, which suggests the donning & removal of clothes, as part of a fashion art installation exhibited at Beirut Design Week in collaboration with the members of Nightmare From Fabric.

Audio Loop - Nightmares From Fabric

Included in Easy Listening Volume One album by Tse Tse Fly Middle East

Continuum

A collaboration between Nour Sokhon and Isaac Sullivan.

Mercury - Nightmares From Fabrick

An alternative soundtrack by Nour Sokhon for the intro to the film Persona (Ingmar Bergman 1966).

Persona Intro (Alternative Soundtrack)

Audiovisual installation "A Random Piece of Someone".

Almost Poetic (Matters of Grey Excerpt)

City Complex (Nour Sokhon and Ziad Moukarzel)

Auto is an auditory installation which took place in a car during an exhibition entitled The Inconvenience of Silence at Haven for Artists in Beirut. 

An auditory experience; recreating the passive act of humans as noise pollutants and their ability to maintain their sense of mental composure. “Auto” highlights intrusive frequencies which lead them to be apathetically assertive with their urban happenings without processing.

Auto- City Complex (Nour Sokhon and Ziad Moukarzel)

A track for an interactive shadow painting, which transforms trash into beauty through up-cycling a translucent pollutant known as “plastic”. Health cannot be bought. It does not matter which class in society one originates from, as we are all humans who breathe in the same air. “Hold Your Breath” encourages people to self-reflect upon an international crisis that Lebanon is suffering from, from within a creative environment. The creators of the installation, Nour Sokhon and Junk Munkez (Lea Kirdikian and Xavier Baghdadi) share common ideologies about the environment. We are water, hence we must not destroy ourselves by contaminating our waters. The soundscape of “Hold your Breath” composed by Nour Sokhon in collaboration with Ziad Moukarzel, reflects the impact that noise pollution has on the abiotic and biotic sounds present within the marine habitat.

“Hold Your Breath” aims to encourage people to conserve Lebanon’s natural image for future generations to come.

Hold Your Breath (Nour Sokhon and Ziad Moukarzel)

The soundtrack of “The Reverse of a Child” is part of a project Nour Sokhon created for Radio Mansion in collaboration with Freya Edmondes. All the sounds in the track are from a sound bank recorded by people from the Mansion community documenting their auditory journey to Mansion and shared through a Whatsapp group. Nour and Freya were fascinated by how they did not know the identity of the people who did those recordings and by what they chose to share from their personal or daily life.

This notion inspired the creation of the film for “The Reverse of a Child” a nightmare lullaby .. the film will be shared with the public in due time

The Reverse Of A Child (Nour Sokhon & Freya Edmonds)

The Ontological Daydream (Live Performance: opening act for Gurumiran at Radio Beirut)
An audio visual journey which invites the audience into an elevating meditative sphere composed of visuals, field recordings and electroacoustic music.
Vocal samples used are from Suzy Nairn

The Ontological Daydream (Live Performance)

Using reference material, Rodrigo collected sounds that reminded him of the Adan's effect in time and space. Sound artist Nour Sokhon built on these recordings, incorporating her own work into the material, to explore the many layers of sounds that occur outside mosques and churches during prayer. 

The artists utilized sound to put the viewer in a perpetual state of renewal within the exhibition space and to highlight the muteness of Rodrigo's paintings.

Visuals by Rodrigo Echeverria
Sound by Nour Sokhon in collaboration with Rodrigo Echeverria

The State

I deconstructed a collection of traumatic voice recordings from anonymous individuals stories which come from different regions of the world. Fragments of the recordings are used to discuss how traumatic moments play a key role in igniting individuals vices as it is vital for individuals to be more empathetic with one another; to hear each other in order for this moment of shock not to evolve into an infectious vice which could engulf an individuals physiological wellbeing. Field recordings of ambience are manipulated live to derange the listeners sensorial experience, allowing them to reflect on how their personal traumas have activated unexpected vices. 

I would like to thank all the people that contributed to the creation of this work. Please be mindful when listening.

Remix_Soloextract__ConfirmHumanity >> is the solo extract of a collaborative performance I did in collaboration with Freya Edmondes at Institut Francais du Liban for Vices & Validations an exhibition/ performance curated by Haven for Artists.

1Remix_Solo_Edit_ConfirmHumanity_Nour_XXFilesSubmission

Remix_soloextract__ConfirmHumanity_LiveatInstitutFrancaisduLiban_Nour Sokhon

A five minute extract from an improvised live performance between Nour Sokhon and Dayna Ash. The performance took place at Frequent Defect (Beirut,Lebanon)  in collaboration with Yo-yo Ma’s Bach Project. 
"The arab is a martyr, the arab is a human shield" by Burakanan. 
Saxophone samples are recordings of Ash Wadi, a Lebanese visual artist.

Drown Out The Other (Dayna Ash & Nour Sokhon) - excerpt - live at Frequent Defect

Volatile Grounds is an auditory installation which is part of a performative installation entitled The Great Report, which took place in Kampnagel, Hamburg. 

Volatile grounds embodies the privatisation of lands and the mismanagement of waste. The incessant neglect in which our hand in nature and lack of respect towards the environment caused this situation to escalate, and is one that we requires our urgent attention. We have already reached a critical point where the repercussions of our actions have led to mass suffering, such as high levels of food and water contamination, medical setbacks, and further detrimental effects towards the people. We cannot continue with this downward spiral lest it leads to the further demise of the entire country and its citizens. 

Anonymous: 

“…we hear from time to time that someone got into the hospital and was cured getting out he contracted a virus so this virus contracted is due to the storage of the psychotoxic thats in the hospitals and there are some apartments within Beirut where are stored these kind of psychotoxics” 


The soundscape is composed of interview material collected in 2019 from anonymous activists a few months before the start of the revolution in Beirut, Lebanon. The content centres around the waste management crisis and land reclamation issue present in the region. 

The raw and manipulated field recordings work as metaphors to convey the constant disharmony present in the country. For instance, crow sounds are used to represent death and the abyss. On the other hand car horns describe the sonic environment of the country and that change needs to happen in order for it to stand back on its feet. The sonic score maintains a high level of density throughout most of the composition, similar to how the country’s citizens have been honking at the politicians for years. 

Coincidently during the early production phase of the project in October 2019 the revolution broke out in the country, which unveiled concealed truths that these anonymous activists had shared in the interviews. 


We give thanks to all the anonymous activists that have contributed their time to Volatile Grounds and The Great Report. 


Interview Material: Moritz Frischkorn & Nour Sokhon

Sound Installation:  Nour Sokhon 

Stage design/ installation: Vladimir Miller 

Artistic Director: Moritz Frischkorn

Volatile Grounds - Track 5 Excerpt

Lebanese artist Nour Sokhon reimagines capacities of the human protest and the human desire as a radical electronic collage absorbing stories of the ‘ordinary people’, the underrepresented in the community that surround her while working from her home studio space. Growing up as an Arab woman, she blatantly describes the confining reality of living with various restrictions to her individual and collective sense of freedom, fuelling her work with film, sound and advocacy. Intergenerational post-war hauntings, awakenings and the struggle for hope both at the worldly and the personal level are the prevalent themes found in her work.

The ongoing Lebanese civil protests and revolution following the pandemic adds to her and her people’s emotional and collective strife, that she seeks to evoke as sonic matter:


On October 17, 2019 the process of rediscovery through listening magnified more than ever, in the streets of Lebanon, where a sea of rage swept the country. The country’s lock-out of spaces has been a norm since then. Isolation, social anxiety, frequent cutbacks in electricity at odd hours of the day, items disappearing from store shelves, people unable to go into social environments and participate in human contact is nothing new. Poverty has taken over, hunger is in the eyes of the people everywhere you walk. The conversations that take place in the local supermarkets, in the shared cabs, and on the streets all carry one common theme: anger. Anger about the prices soaring, anger about the lack of proper infrastructure, anger about lack of basic public services and anger about the root cause of it all: the government’s extreme level of corruption.


Sokhon’s association with sound emphasizes its political and social possibilities; she uses field recordings and samples to write up the lives of people who are oppressed and subjugated.


My desire is to sincerely translate the frailing energies of human and civilian struggle flowing through the veins of my country Lebanon in recent months at the hands of time tested injustice, leading to perhaps an imminent economic and cultural collapse.


Rectification of the Wretched is composed to remind her people that there are still dreams that they can seek.


I am with the people, and seek reformation. Before the start of quarantine I used to find myself in the streets. At the moment I have lost hope, yet I find it necessary to not succumb to the dark pit of despair. My personal sense of empowerment, my weapon, rises and awakens through sound amidst all the chaos. I would like to rediscover the current turbulence we open our eyes to every morning by amplifying the silenced voices of the people. I would like to create a figment of hope through the power of imagination by asking locals one question. What do they dream of?


The resulting soundscape is a narration of twelve different voices. Conducted through Whatsapp, the interviewees responded to the same question posed: What do they dream of?

Editorial edit by Alifiyah Imani
Full essay is published here: https://spatialsoundinstitute.com/P_Composing-Sonic-Futures

Rectification Of The Wretched - Nour Sokhon

Tumultuous Convolutions

Nour Sokhon is a Lebanese artist, sound designer and filmmaker based in Beirut, Lebanon. Her creative explorations have been in the form of sound performances, installations and moving images. In 2014, she achieved an undergraduate degree in Fine Arts from The American University in Dubai. In 2017, during her time at the Glasgow School of Art in the United Kingdom, she culminated a large scale Masters project; a documentary entitled “People on Sound”. In 2019, she received the Emerging Artist Prize at the Sursock Museum, for a moving image piece entitled "Revisiting: Hold Your Breath”.

Nour has exhibited her artwork in Dubai, London, Glasgow, Paris, and Beirut. She has also performed in Berlin, Beirut, Dubai, Paris and in different festivals such as the Al Quoz Arts Festival (Dubai, UAE) and the Other Worlds Festival (Blackpool, UK).

She is a member of three collectives: Tse Tse Fly Middle East (sound), Glitch Artists Collective (transdisciplinary) and Nightmares From Fabrik (transdisciplinary)

Nour Sokhon

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