The Grief Interval \\ Aura Satz with Sarah Davachi

In this audiovisual broadcast, artist Aura Satz collaborated with electroacoustic composer Sarah Davachi to sonically haunt a decommissioned coal fired power station. Weaving eerie aural warning and mourning, the film project summoned the possibility of the pause in a landscape of looming ecological emergency.

Following the premiere of The Grief Interval, writer Harry Sword joined Aura Satz and Sarah Davachi in a conversation to reflect on the film, their processes and projects. 

The film and conversation was broadcast on Saturday 10 July 2021 at andfestival.org.uk/live, and was available to watch online until Sunday 11 July.

Post-event Conversation

Participant biographies 

Sarah Davachi

As a composer and performer of electroacoustic music, Sarah Davachi’s work is concerned with the close intricacies of intimate aural space, utilizing extended durations and simple harmonic structures that emphasize subtle variations in texture, overtone complexity, psychoacoustic phenomena, and temperament and intonation.  The instrumentation she employs is varied, including electric organ, pipe and reed organ, tape-replay samplers, piano, analog synthesizers, voice, early Western strings and keyboards, and orchestral strings, brass, and woodwinds.  Albums include Cantus, Descant (2020) Pale Bloom (2019); Gave in Rest (2018), Let Night Come On Bells End The Day (2018). Davachi has toured extensively across the globe and has shared the stage and collaborated with artists such as Grouper, William Basinski, Ariel Kalma, the Bozzini Quartet, the London Contemporary Orchestra, Oren Ambarchi, Donald Buchla, Suzanne Ciani, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, and many more. 

Aura Satz

Aura Satz’s work encompasses film, sound, performance and sculpture. Works are made in conversation and use dialogue as both method and subject matter, often examining technology with a focus on generating new soundscapes, and in turn new forms of listening. She has performed, exhibited and screened her work nationally and internationally, including Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Hayward Gallery, Sydney Biennale 2016, NTT InterCommunication Center, Tokyo, High Line Art, MoMA NY, Kadist SF, and Sharjah Art Foundation. She has presented solo exhibitions at the Wellcome Collection, London; the Hayward Gallery project space, London; John Hansard Gallery, Southampton; Dallas Contemporary, Texas; George Eastman Museum, Rochester among others.  Satz has worked collaboratively with filmmaker Lis Rhodes, and with a wide range of composers, vocalists and musicians. She is currently developing her first feature film centred on the sound of sirens and emergency signals.

Harry Sword

Harry Sword is a Cambridge based writer. A regular contributor to The Quietus, Vice, Record Collector and The Guardian, Monolithic Undertow is his first book.

The Grief Interval is commissioned and produced by Abandon Normal Devices. Supported using public funding by Arts Council England and Culture Warrington.

Image © Copyright Alan Murray-Rust and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence