Robin Félix

"I live and work in Switzerland and elsewhere, in various types of terrain. A graduate of ECAL and HEAD, I practise sound art — which makes me an audio-naturalist. My work process revolves around three stages.

The first, listening, is essential: this is where it all begins. Armed with my microphone, my main instrument, I record the sound environment around me. Every place has the potential to be recorded. These sounds, captured in a variety of contexts, become material for composition. I seek a form of harmony in the soundscape, highlighting natural, industrial or prefabricated sounds and improvising with the terrain.

My approach, both sensitive and scientific, consists of surveying a territory and mapping its acoustic riches. Chance, intuition and spontaneity guide my listening. I try to save strange, beautiful or intimate sounds from oblivion: traces of a fleeting past that gradually form my personal sound diary.

The second stage – amalgame – is based on acousmatic listening, detached from context. I then leave the field for the studio: the sounds become materials to be manipulated, combined, stretched or left raw, like ready-made sounds. This phase tests my writing skills: it is a matter of telling a story with sounds.

 

Finally, the third stage depends on the form the project will take: album, performance, installation or archive, depending on the paths its sounds take over time and through experimentation."