8 Apr 2025
The Art Gallery of New South Wales launches 2025 experimental music series
The Art Gallery of New South Wales launches 2025 experimental music series
Contemporary music fans are returning to the Art Gallery of New South Wales for Volume presents: Fixtures, a new music program showcasing live, experimental music in all its forms.
Volume presents: Fixtures was born from the success of the Art Gallery’s flagship music series Volume, which featured memorable programs like Future tilt with DeepFaith, Lydian Dunbar and salllvage, and Extasis with Jim O’Rourke, Eiko Ishibashi, Keiji Heino and more. Volume presents: Fixtures is a series of free performances by Australian and international artists that extends the Art Gallery’s commitment to presenting cutting-edge contemporary music in an art museum setting.
Art Gallery of New South Wales music and community curator Jonathan Wilson said: ‘Volume presents: Fixtures is an exciting evolution in our music programming, spotlighting emerging and established experimental musicians from Australia and around the world and forging connections between art and music.’
The first iteration of Volume presents: Fixtures, held from March to June, showcases musicians and performers whose work addresses experiences of climate change. The second iteration of the program, held from August to December, will spotlight musical collaborations between artists whose work shifts between multilingual, First Nations and cross-cultural contemporary pop, electronic and experimental music.
On Wednesday 16 April, St Petersburg-born, Berlin-based sound artist and performer Perila will present her first Australian performance, drawing on recent work that utilises raw emotions, the voice and the body to create healing and transformative sonic interventions. Perila encourages deep engagement with her performances via listening, observation, presence and mutual dialogue with an audience and her surroundings.
On Wednesday 21 May, Sydney-based Seaworthy and Western Australia-based Matt Rösner will perform their recent recordings Bundanon (2024) and Deep Valley (2024), originating in 2023 at the Bundanon artist-in-residence program in Illaroo, New South Wales. The works respond to their time spent in the local Illaroo environment and are inspired by the sonic textures of wind, tide, insects and birds.
On Wednesday 18 June, French electro-acoustic composer and visual artist Félicia Atkinson will present her first Sydney performance playing works from her latest album, Space as an instrument. This performance will be replete with her signature collages of vocals, field recordings, instrumentation and snippets of essayistic language in both French and English.
The program launched on Wednesday 19 March, with a sold-out performance by Australian composer and performer Lisa Lerkenfeldt who premiered her new musical work In the window of time, commissioned by the prestigious INA GRM in Paris, France. In the window of time comprises piano and a set of custom-made tape loops, which Lerkenfeldt exposed to the Australian sun for a year to create degraded sounds and tonal shifts that broke down over the course of her innovative live performance to a rapt audience.
Volume presents: Fixtures is presented on the third Wednesday night of each month in Meers Hall in the Art Gallery of New South Wales’ Naala Badu building. The program includes Perila on Wednesday 16 April at 8pm, Seaworthy and Matt Rösner on Wednesday 21 May at 8pm, and Félicia Atkinson on Wednesday 18 June at 8pm. More performances will be announced soon.
Tickets are free and available to book now via the Art Gallery website. Subscribe to the Art Gallery’s Artmail e-newsletter to stay up to date on news for this event.
Media contacts:
Ella Beer
Communications advisor
+61 420 236 608
ella.beer@ag.nsw.gov.au
Sarah Shields
Acting head of strategic communications
+61 408 283 091
sarah.shields@ag.nsw.gov.au