RELAY - Thinking Artistic Material in Music and Dance

"<< Background >>“RELAY - Thinking Artistic Material in Music and Dance” addressed the need for a paradigm shift in arts education and beyond, emphasising sustainability, diversity, and adaptability alongside artistic skills. It questioned how institutions can remain flexible while preparing students for dynamic work environments and promoting critical thinking. It addressed a pressing gap in interdisciplinary collaboration, for example the need for musicians to attune to the dynamics of dance and vice versa. By facilitating exchanges between fields, it explored innovative approaches to co-creation, knowledge transfer, and institutional workflows.RELAY explored sustainable mobility & work practices, developing models for environmentally friendly logistics and advocating for mental well-being in the arts. It also tackled the challenge of balancing globalisation with regional particularities, viewing Europe’s diversity as a strength for innovation.Lastly, the project created ""third spaces"" for collaboration beyond institutional boundaries, fostering resilient networks essential for the international nature of dance & music. These efforts highlighted the role of artistic practices in driving socio-political innovation, addressing global challenges.<< Objectives >>Generating Artistic Materials and Expanding Knowledge: A key goal was to generate unique artistic material by exploring the interplay between choreography, composition and their material and immaterial aspects. Transformation processes, such as the “relaying” concept, were designed and implemented in order to empower participants to engage actively with transitional moments and the creative potential of the in-between. These approaches not only contributed to existing knowledge but also strengthened the position of art as a source of innovation.Developing New Modes of Collaboration: RELAY promoted innovative collaboration by creating handovers between institutions and participants. These handovers enabled each institution and participant to engage in ways that reflected their unique contexts, needs, and capacities. By emphasizing situated knowledge and local awareness, we aimed to foster peer-to-peer learning and established foundations for future sustainable collaborations.Sustaining Transnational Collaborations: We adopted sustainable practices, such as using travel time as work time or reusing artistic material instead of adding new content to encourage reflection on sustainability within creative and institutional processes.<< Implementation >>Activities included five LTTAs, three MEs, seven TPMs, a total number of 29 online meetings and “In-Betweens”. The “In-Betweens” refer to the application of RELAY principles and methods between events or beyond the scope of the project itself.Learning, Teaching, Training Activities (LTTAs)The LTTAs were held at the four partner institutions (DASPA Copenhagen, HfMT Cologne, CNDB/UNAMB & UNATC Bucharest and Sikinnis Heraklion) and gathered students, mentors, and invited experts across partner organisations. Notable contributors included choreographer Claire Cunningham (LTTA1 & LTTA4), visual artist Floriama Candea & scientist Marian Zamfirescu (LTTA3) and musician Ross Daly (LTTA5). LTTA5 also integrated the local Heraklion community. Each on-site LTTA provided a deep exploration of the local environment, tailoring its focus to the specific cultural and artistic context. Each LTTA focused on a different aspect:LTTA1 & LTTA2 (Cologne and Copenhagen): Investigated the reciprocity between form and content.LTTA3 (Bucharest): Organised as an ""urban camping"" format, exploring the relationship between movement and sound through collaborative, practice-based learning.LTTA4 (Cologne): Focused on practice-based artistic processes, delving into the interplay between immaterial and material aspects of choreography, dance, music, and composition. It also fostered innovative collaboration models.LTTA5 (Heraklion): Titled “Being [in] a Fortress""; this LTTA combined artistic practice with historical heritage, examining how artistic work is influenced by the identity and narratives of specific locations. It approached historical material as a source of inspiration and engaged with the local community to ensure accessibility and relevance.Multiplier Events (MEs)All three multiplier events focused on disseminating the project results ARTicle and ARTwork in their different steps of development throughout the project. This also included theoretically oriented presentations, practice-based workshops, and other formats, bringing the RELAY methods into concrete practice.ME1 took place in April 2023 in Cologne in the form of a Symposium, presenting the RELAY project results and additionally inviting experts from the fields of music and dance with workshops, presentations, talks and artistic material on the four topics/fields “relationship of content, relay and form”,“exploring the in-betweens and passing-overs of material in the artistic and academic field”, “exploring mutual grounds” and “exploring sustainable practices”. Imbedding the dissemination of the project results into a symposium with international artists, researchers, students and experts laid a fruitful soil for the multiplication of both practical and theoretical knowledge, the intertwining of sharing and receiving, the intertwining of networks and the multiplication of findings of the RELAY project to a wider community.The second ME was held at the conference of International Network for Contemporary Performing Arts (IETM) in Aarhus, Denmark in June 2023. The presentation gave the possibility to share both questions and findings that RELAY had produced thus far and to enter in dialogue around the project’s stakes, benefits and challenges. It was composed along the topics that also structure the exposition of the project results in form of the ARTicle on the online platform Research Catalogue: “relaying”, “sustainability”, “multitude of perspectives”, “transformational practices” and “learning” as well as a presentation of the second project result: ARTwork, giving the participants a practical as well as conceptual understanding of the project and its findings. Placing ME2 in the IETM frame gained an extra benefit in terms of networking aspects and also functioned as a form of benchmarking for our project.The third and last multiplier event took place in July 2024 in Vienna within the LACE symposium in cooperation with Impulstanz. It included a presentation format as well as three practical workshop formats to disseminate the project's findings, tools and methods directly to artists, artistic researchers and students from various artistic fields.Transnational Project Meetings (TPMs)All seven TPMs were strategically aligned with either a Learning, Teaching, and Training Activity (LTTA) or a Multiplier Event (ME). They took place at all four partner institutions/countries (DASPA Copenhagen/Denmark, HfMT Cologne/Germany, CNDB/UNAMB & UNATC Bucharest/Romania, Sikinnis Heraklion/Greece) as well as at the two ME venues in Aarhus/Denmark and Vienna/Austria. This approach allowed administrative staff to gain valuable insights into the content-focused aspects of the LTTAs and MEs. This fostered greater coherence and a shared understanding of the project across the diverse professional expertise within the consortium.Content-wise, the TPMs were critical for overall project management, addressing administrative and organizational matters, and advancing the project’s development. They played a key role in shaping both the conceptual framework and the tangible results of the project.Online MeetingsRegular monthly follow-up meetings, led by the project coordinator, were held with all members of the consortium, including both administrative and research groups. These meetings ensured a steady workflow and effective communication across the team. The agendas covered current work packages, project milestones, administrative matters, and ongoing topics such as budget management.“In-Betweens” and further ImplementationRELAY paid great attention to the in-betweens of the events. At the end of each event a “time capsule” with artistic material was produced and passed on to the next event to be opened up and continuously transformed. In this sense, each event stayed connected to both past and future and created an over-arching temporality of the entire project. The time capsules travelled with participants from one event to the next.Furthermore, RELAY principles and methods were implemented beyond the project itself, for example in the curriculum of teaching activities outside the project, such as seminars and lectures.An Overview of the “In-Betweens” and further implementation is attached to this report.<< Results >>The first key output of the project was the development of the ARTicle, a written and graphic resource designed to share findings with a broader community. The ARTicle was conceived as a bridge between academia and the arts, making insights accessible not only to researchers but also to artists, educators, students and practitioners from non-academic backgrounds. By publishing the ARTicle on the online platform Research Catalogue (RC), it supports interdisciplinary dialogue, fosters accessibility, and participates in questioning traditional divisions between science and art.The ARTicle’s primary focus is the transposition of artistic research findings, allowing them to be adapted across contexts. It functions both as a documentation and a toolkit - provided in the section/on the subpage ""ToolCloud"" - offering methodologies and frameworks that can be adjusted rather than replicated. This flexibility encourages practitioners to connect research insights with their own artistic and pedagogical practices, facilitating reflection on fundamental questions such as: why do we make art?By continually updating and adjusting its content based on ongoing discussions and findings, the ARTicle embodies a living document that evolves with its users. It serves not only as an academic output but also as a practical tool for fostering innovation and accessibility across artistic and educational fields.This approach highlights the potential of artistic research to transcend disciplinary boundaries, creating new modes of inquiry and interaction that resonate with diverse communities.The second key outcome is ARTwork, which is both a concrete project result as well as a method used throughout the project: an evolving sculpture created throughout the LTTAs that travelled between the events in the form of a “time capsule”, ensuring continuity and engagement in collective artistic and knowledge production: At the end of each LTTA, the participants distilled the last version of the sculpture by taking away objects, leaving written messages and gathering those into an assemblage of objects that fit into a small suitcase. Besides being a sustainable means of transportation, the time capsules also functioned as a way to avoid the sort of overproduction that can take place when each event starts from scratch. Instead, participants could build onto the work from previous LTTAs without the need for an exact rebuilding of what had been. Materials were recycled as starting points for new sculptures.The sculptures incorporated local materials specific to each event’s location and generic materials that could be found at any of the four sites. The sculptures were shaped by scores that provided frameworks for collaboration, allowing participants to (trans-)form and activate the installation with both performed and physical materials. As the project progressed, the sculptures morphed, culminating in a closing ceremony where the sculpture was distilled into a new time capsule in each event. This process created a sense of continuity across the events, with materials from each LTTA contributing to the overall project. The sculpture took its final shape in the form of miniature sculptures which have been packed into letters with personal messages from participants.The scores for collaboration are available as open source in the ToolCloud on the research catalogue page, where a photo documentation of the sculptures can be found as well. A selection of scores has been gathered in a booklet/publication and, alongside the sculpture letters, sent out to project associates, art institutions and interested parties who signed up for one of the letters online or during one of the MEs.Compared to the ARTicle, the documentation and dissemination of the ARTwork is designed to engage a wide - also non-academic - range of practitioners, offering a path for those who prefer a more creative, visual, or hands-on approach to the content.These two outputs - ARTwork and ARTicle - serve different types of learners, each providing a tailored experience based on individual needs and preferences. This dual approach - academic and creative - encourages broader accessibility and a more inclusive dissemination of knowledge.Another result of the project were interdisciplinary collaborations that came to life through the project’s activities: Throughout the project, the encounters between students, teachers and staff played a vital role in building new networks and fostering collaboration. Concrete examples of collaborations include partnerships between students as well as between students and mentors and the organisations itself, outside of the frame of the project. An overview can be found in the document “In-Betweens and further Implementation”. The collaborative nature of the project also led to the creation of artistic content, including compositions, video works, performances, and other media such as social media content, website updates, and event documentation. These outcomes were the direct result of the collaborative processes initiated during the project’s meetings and were shared widely across platforms to reach a larger audience.By combining academic, practical, and artistic approaches, the project has not only produced tangible outputs but has also facilitated long-term, sustainable collaborations that will continue to influence participants' work and foster future exchanges."