The Research and Academic Program presents "Shifting Focal Points": Sergei Tcherepnin on Sonic Attention.

In this episode of the Research and Academic Program (RAP) podcast In the Foreground: Conversations on Art & Writing, Caitlin Woolsey (assistant director of RAP) speaks with Sergei Tcherepnin, an artist who works at the intersections of sound, music, sculpture, theater, and photography. We discuss how his work is made to be interacted with and creates new intimacies in listening. Sergei’s work invites listening by hearing, but also listening by way of touching, by walking, by pressing, and by feeling. He describes how he seeks to create multiple focal points within each work, activating a kind of queer sound or queer listening.

Sergei Tcherepnin orchestrates complex multi-channel compositions in which objects are transformed into speakers. Often invoking queer, hybridized characters, these scenarios cultivate play between things and bodies. His performances and installations have been presented at the Museum der Moderne, Salzburg; Overduin & Co., Los Angeles; Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Roulette, New York; MoMA, New York; Pavilion of Georgia at the 55th Venice Biennale; Murray Guy, New York; the Kitchen, New York; Yvon Lambert, Paris; Karma International, Zurich; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; and the 30th São Paulo Biennial, among other venues. He was a Villa Romana Fellow in 2014. A recurring visiting faculty member at Bennington College between 2016 and 2022, Sergei continues to teach at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, Austria. He holds a BFA and MFA from Bard, and lives and works in New York City.

This episode launches on Tuesday, April 4. For more information and to listen to the episode, check clarkart.edu/rap/podcast, iTunes, Spotify, and anywhere else you may listen to podcasts.

Image: Sergei Tcherepnin, detail of Spectrum (Strange Attractor), Company Gallery, NY.