Experimental Sound Laboratory at MOMus – Museum of Modern Art – Costakis Collection  

Led by Andrey Smirnov 

September – October 2023: “Sound Revolution” lecture series  

Electronic sound, its history, its dimensions and connection with the present constitute the triptych of these seminar constituted of 4 lectures entitled “Experimental Sound Laboratory at MOMus – Museum of Modern Art – Costakis Collection Led by Andrey Smirnov”   

The most prolific and adventurous period in the history of sound experimentation and musical technology in Russian Avant-Garde, but also in the broader European Historical Avant-Gardes, is without a doubt that which ranges from 1910 to the end of the 1930s, when musicians turned to studying Physics and the development of pioneering ideas. Mathematicians started studying music theory and the artists that had understood the major principles of acoustics worked on new methods for the synthesis and transformation of sound.  

The Experimental Sound Laboratory at MOMus – Museum of Modern Art – Costakis Collection is based on the historical documents and original electronic musical instruments from the personal collection of Andrey Smirnov relating to that period, and aims at studying the Avant-Garde sound culture and to revive as well as advance the accomplishments of related technologies that proved to be many decades ahead of their time. The value and meaning of these ideas highly exceed the sphere of Russian Avant-Garde. Today, we usually utilize them not being aware of their origins, while multiple ideas evolve in a new, creative manner.  

The Experimental Sound Laboratory will develop educational programs in the form of lectures and workshops, targeted to musicians and music historians as well as to the general public, with a distinct interest in Russian Avant-Garde, sound and new media art, electronic and electroacoustic music.  

Curriculum Vitae 

Andrey Smirnov is a musical artist and researcher, known worldwide for his innovative teaching method and his research in the fields of electronic music and the history of Avant-Garde music alongside visual arts. He is the founder of the Theremin Centre and has been the Head of Sound Laboratory at the Rodchenko Art – School in Moscow. He teaches courses on the history and aesthetics of electro-acoustic music, sound design and composition, new musical interfaces and physical computing.  

Andrey has conducted many workshops and seminars, targeted both at professionals and the general public, in the USA, Europe and Russia and he has participated at significant festivals and conferences.  

Andrey Smirnov is the author of the books «Sound In Z: Experiments in Sound and Electronic Music in Early 20th Century Russia» (Walther Koenig & Sound and Music, London, 2013) and «In Search of Lost Sound. Experimental Sound Culture in Russia and USSR in the first half of the 20th century» (Moscow, GARAGE, 2020) (The Book of the Year Award, Innovation 2021). 

From September 2023, Andrey works as a special scientific associate at Momus Museum of Modern Art, Costakis Collection in Thessaloniki.  

Detailed Lectures’ Program 

All lectures will be held in English without interpretation.  

Experimental Sound Laboratory 

Seminar; Lecture Series 2023: “Sound Revolution” 

September – October 2023  

«The Revolutionary Sound Machines» 

Thursday, 28 September 2023 | 18:00-20:00 

Momus – Thessaloniki Museum of Photography 

Warehouse A, Pier A, Thessaloniki Port Area

While the 20th Century is one of the most over-documented in the history of the world, yet it seems, the history of experimental and electronic sound and music, and the impact that it has had on our culture, is largely unknown even by authoritative scholars. The lecture gives an overview of some of the most important and radical inventions, made in the 1920-30-s by Soviet inventors. Living in famine and poverty, creative people were dreaming about the art, music and science of the future, where everything would be different — a perfect man, a classless society, a perfect science and technology. The Theremin and the Rhythmicon, early synthesizers, noise orchestras, graphical sound, syntones and audio computing — these were just a few of the Soviet experiments in music technology and sound art developed by the artists, actors, filmmakers and poets. Many inventors patented new sound machines intended specially for performance of the noise music. Some devices based on electro-optical, electro-mechanical and newest electronic technologies were ahead of their time by decades.   

The lecture is held within the framework of the Electroacoustic Music and Audiovisual Arts Festival “Stereoma” implemented at the venue.  

Participation Information: 

• Registrations at info.modern@momus.gr or at +30 2310 589143, up until Thursday the 28th of September 2023 at 14:00. An order of precedence will be followed.  
• An attendance certificate will be given to participants 
• Participation fee:  
• €80 / person,  
• €60 / person for students, upon presentation of a student ID 
• Depending on availability, the cost of participation at a 2-hour lecture is €30/person and €20 for students, upon presentation of a student ID