Exhibition and performance of graphic scores
An exhibition of graphic scores created during the Szumologia workshops held in December 2025 will be the central element of the evening. Participants translated their sonic experiences of the city into visual notation – lines, colours and textures. During the event, these visual records will be transformed back into sound.
The performance of graphic scores brings together artistic and research practices: it is both a concert and an experiment in the translatability of auditory experience across media – from the sound of the city, through drawing and back into sound.
Performers:
Joanna Szumacher – electronics
Michał Rupniewski – violin
Justyna Anders-Morawska – keyboards
Guide presentation
The event will also feature the presentation of the guide “Miasto do słuchania. Przewodnik po dźwiękowym poznawaniu przestrzeni” [A City to Listen To: A Guide to Exploring Space Through Sound] – a publication designed for cultural practitioners, educators, urban planners and urban activists. It presents six methods of sonic engagement with the city developed and tested within the project. The methods have been designed to be accessible and do not require musical training or professional recording equipment. The publication, authored by Dr Justyna Anders‑Morawska (methods of spatial listening) and Dr Michał Sędkowski (audience engagement and relational practices), will be published in a bilingual Polish–English edition.
Project Trajectory
The project ran from autumn 2025 to May 2026 and explored sound-based methods of engaging with urban space. Activities included:
- A concert of field recordings collected as part of artistic and research projects (Joanna Szumacher), performed in dialogue with piano (Justyna Anders‑Morawska), accompanied by a discussion on field recording with Piotr Dąbrowski, Joanna Szumacher, dr Maciej Adamiak and Bartosz Nowicki.
- The Szumologia graphic score workshops (December 2025), where participants created graphic scores and mental maps as forms of recording the sonic perception of the city.
- Audio interviews with residents of Łódź conducted by students of International Cultural Studies at the University of Lodz with individuals of different ages.
- Rhythmanalysis of the city block bordered by Włókiennicza, Wschodnia and Jaracza Streets and Majewski Passage—students conducted observations of urban rhythms at four points within the block, documenting them through rhythm diaries, continuous audio recordings and observational notes
- Perforhythms – in April 2026 at WY Gallery, dr hab. Zorka Wollny, Associate Professor at the Academy of Art in Szczecin, guided participants through the construction of an urban soundscape using the voice, structured across three layers: biophony, geophony and anthropophony. Students of International Cultural Studies at the University of Lodz presented the results of the rhythmanalysis and concepts for performative micro‑interventions
- In May 2026, in the park of the Biedermann's Palace, Dr Justyna Anders‑Morawska conducted attentive listening sessions as part of the accompanying programme “Come to the Park – It Is Yours”. These sessions explored the acoustic dimension of a historic urban park. Participants engaged in three perceptual modes: stationary listening (narrowing and expanding auditory focus), sound walks identifying points of acoustic change, and micro‑listening—placing the ear to tree trunks, the ground and listening beneath the surface using a geophone. Dr Justyna Anders‑Morawska also presented different trajectories of the park’s sonic futures in the lecture “Usłyszeć przyszłość parku” [Hearing the Future of the Park], based on research into speculative soundscapes. Three scenarios for the park’s acoustic future – two dystopian and one conditionally permissible – were examined against available data: the park’s acoustic map, applicable noise regulations, ownership structures and recent research on urban park acoustics.
Research partners from University College Cork – Dr Jeffrey Weeter and Sebastian Novoa Peña –visited Łódź in March 2026 and participated in field sessions and working meetings at WY Gallery.
Source: Dr Justyna Anders-Morawska
Edit: Centre for Organising Cultural Events and Conferences, University of Lodz
