Petra Kapš / Dew. Gaia ∞ Cosmos
Petra Kapš / Dew. Gaia ∞ Cosmos
Judgement Tower, Pristan 8, Maribor
5 July–10 August 2025
opening: Saturday, 5 July 2025, 19:00
opening hours: Wednesday–Sununday, 10:00–18:00
curator: Andreja Borin
Petra Kapš (a.k.a OR poiesis) is one of the few Slovenian artists whose work focusses on sound installations/performances and on blending audio and various visual practices. For her presentation at the Judgement Tower she invited Nikos Sotirelis, a Greek architect, sound artist, and electroacoustic music composer to collaborate in this exhibition.
"The primary conceptual focus of the exhibition is the cosmic serpent, Gaia Cosmos, along with the vibrations and frequencies that impact us and the world around us, yet often remain (for the most part) invisible and inaudible," the artist explains. In this exhibition, she features multiple solo works (video performance, sound sculpture, performative prints), which she merges into a unified visual and sound composition, finely attuned to the atmosphere of the medieval tower. Central to Kapš's work are unconventional practices, such as deep listening, the interception of barely perceptible movements in matter, silent coexistence with beings of the Earth, air, and water, physical performative rituals, converting immaterial experiences into visual images, performances involving rocks and sound, performative photography, and more.
Petra Kapš is a freediver. Equipped only with a microphone and her own body, she dives into the deepest reaches of the terrestrial to gaze upwards from the ocean floor, underneath the Triglav Glacier, from the edge of Vesuvius, or through the Pohorje primeval forest—all the way to the starry nebulae, all the way to the cosmic sound of oneness. On the ground floor of the Judgement Tower, the descent into the earthly sphere is illustrated by the video-sound performance known as Attraction. Petrification. The artist drew her inspiration from the poetically mysterious environment of the Pohorje primeval forest near the Šumik Waterfall. In this piece, she examines the relationship of closeness with the body of water and the body of rocks. On the first floor of the Judgement Tower, the artist showcases her intermedia sound sculpture and multi-channel composition SELINI, An Instrument of Silence, addressing the changing states of water, the melting of glaciers, and geophony—the deep listening to the Earth and its mineral corporality. Slightly distanced from the walls are floating scans that present performative stone-cosmic images, created using a scanner, mirror, stones, and the artist's body by following lunar cycles. Video works from the projects Irreversible Loop and Crystalline Bodies—poetic animations of numerous photographs taken at the sites of the Skuta and the Triglav Glaciers—are exhibited on the balcony of the Judgement Tower. In this work, Kapš not only addresses the material melting of glaciers but also descends to deeper and even mystical levels of existence. She explores the profound sensations associated with glacial corpora (currently on the brink of existence), which serve as both receivers of cosmic energy and transmitters of their own resonance.
A fresh sound composition by the Greek sound artist Nikos Sotirelis Tuning the Void - Ghosts of the Ionosphere will be spatially arranged in the dome of the Judgement Tower. Cosmic radiations pervade the surrounding space like inaudible frequencies throughout the universe. Celestial bodies, black holes, and anthropogenic radio waves generate sounds that exceed the audible spectrum of human perception and traverse through the cosmos. The initial concept for the spatial arrangement of the sound field is based on the design of a sonic dome, with sound radiating and moving through the space. In the expansive ambience of the Judgement Tower, the sound compositions of Petra Kapš and Nikos Sotirelis meet, intertwine, and intervene with each other, resulting in the creation of a new cosmic reality.
Petra Kapš (a.k.a OR poiesis, born in Maribor) is an artist, composer, and researcher in the fields of bio-, geo- in hydro-acoustics, merging elemental life and the secrets of the Earth with Arte Sonora, experimental music, and visual-performative practices. Her artistic ventures include developing deeply attentive modalities of listening and recording, and creating artworks that engage with the sanctity of all life forms. She works in both Slovenian and international settings. She is a co-founder of biom.microeditions, a founding member of the CENSE (Central European Network for Sonic Ecologies) association, and a member of the JATA C bioacoustic group and the radio.earth collective. She lives in Maribor and creates both locally and internationally while travelling the world for different artistic residencies.
Nikos Sotirelis from Greece is an architect, curator, audiovisual artist, and electroacoustic music composer. He is notable for his multidisciplinary approach, which integrates sound, space, and technology, perceiving sound and architecture as tools for emotional and experiential engagement. His music draws inspiration from science, history, mythology, space, nature, acoustic ecology, cinematic architecture, lost tribes, and the unknown. His artistic pursuits include sound pieces for theatre, site-specific installations, experimental radio broadcasts, performances, and publications. He is the founder and curator of the Nekubi Artist Residency, the Nekubi Tapes Label, and a co-founder of biom.microeditions. Nikos Sotirelis has created a number of innovative electroacoustic pieces, with some distinguished by their conceptual depth and experimental approaches.
organization and coproduction: UGM | Maribor Art Gallery
DodecaOTTO ambisonic systems: HEKA and Kuber
support: Mauricio Valdés San Emeterio, PiNA, Borut Jerman
project partners: Minoriti and Maribor Puppet Theatre
