10.05.2023
9:30 – 18:00 UTC
Royal College of Art, London

On Wednesday 10 May, 10am-5pm BST, we gather with a small group of artists, scholars and technologists working on or with VOICE and VOICES. 

In this in-person, campfire-style symposium, we will explore voice and its aesthetic, sociopolitical, and technoscientific implications, in conversation with artists, scholars, scientists and technologists.

In the last decade or so, there has been a notable ‘vocal turn’ in cultural studies and artistic practice that is reflected in a range of publications on the constitution of the human voice; its role in culture and society; its links with disability; machines; and ‘otherness’. At the same time, recent advances in computing—and in particular the explosion of artificial intelligence—have seen computational research and application on the human-sounding voice, machine listening and voice as identity, approaching levels of sophistication and scale formerly thought impossible.

The aim of the gathering is to bring together people in a moment of joyful study and vocal play, including performances, screenings and conversations, with a range of researchers from different fields. We hope for this to be a small step towards creating a community of study on the topic of voices/voicing.

Voice in the Machine is organised by Eleni Ikoniadou (Royal College of Art) and Jonathan Reus (University of Sussex), and is supported by the RCA.