CTM FESTIVAL 2020 - LIMINAL FESTIVAL DATES & THEME, CALL FOR WORKS
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PRESS RELEASE 14 JUNE 2019
CTM FESTIVAL 2020 – LIMINAL
FESTIVAL DATES & THEME, CALL FOR WORKS
FESTIVAL FOR ADVENTUROUS MUSIC & ART, BERLIN
21ST EDITION, 24 JANUARY – 2 FEBRUARY 2020
We are living through liminal times. We bear witness to social and technological shifts, pushed
and pulled by numerous processes of transformation. Due to cultural, ecological, geographical,
and political negotiations, we find ourselves stuck between an unsustainable past and
contestable futures. The well-known and familiar no longer promise stability nor certainty, but the
solutions for an encouraging future often remain out of sight. We are in between. Amidst
ambivalence and perpetual shift, we drift without assurance nor certainty. Entitled Liminal, CTM
2020 throws itself into limbo in hopes of stimulating a critical discussion of our present and
possible futures. Music has long been a site of negotiating boundary-disturbing experiences and
acts of transgression. The liminal characterises many cultural, spiritual, and social practices and
rituals associated with music. It is the fundamental challenging of norms and identities. At the
same time it is a contact zone with the "other," the unconscious, and altered forms of being. So
can it be used as a space for experimentation? As we rustle, challenge, disturb, and disrupt
boundaries, can we tread through liminality to concoct and build new ways of being with one
another? With this in mind, CTM 2020 examines the potentials of experimental politics in liminal
spaces that, for now, must make do without tangible utopias.
Multiple calls are now open to artists and researchers worldwide. The CTM 2020 Radio Lab Call for
Works seeks proposals for works that relate to the CTM 2020 theme and explore hybrid
possibilities of radio and live performance mediums. The yearly call is a collaboration between
CTM, Deutschlandfunk Kultur, Goethe-Institut, ORF Austrian Broadcasting Service and The Wire
magazine. New within the scope of the Radio Lab is an additional call for works titled Kontinuum,
which seeks proposals for a generative audio stream to be played 24/7 over the period of 365
days, which may explore themes such as machine learning/AI in music and the continuous inputs
and outputs we live through today.
A division of DISK / CTM – Baurhenn, Rohlf, Schuurbiers GbR • Veteranenstraße 21, 10119 Berlin, Germany
Tax Number 34/496/01492 • International VAT Number DE813561158
|1|
Bank Account: Berliner Sparkasse • BLZ: 10050000 • KTO: 636 24 508 • IBAN: De42 1005 0000 0063 6245 08 • BIC: BE LA DE BEStudents, as well as junior and senior researchers and scholars are sought for the Research
Networking Day call for papers, which looks for innovative and critical submissions in all areas of
study addressing the scope of CTM 2020’s Liminal theme. Presented in collaboration with the UdK
Berlin University of the Arts, Humboldt University, and the German Association for Music Business
and Music Culture Research (GMM).
As always, CTM Festival will combine first-hand experience and critical reflection in a programme
housed at various Berlin venues including longtime partners Berghain, HAU Hebbel am Ufer, and
Kunstquartier Bethanien. Club events and concerts will be complemented by wide-ranging
discourse and debate via daytime lectures and artist talks, a Hacklab, the CTM Exhibition, and
more.
CTM Festival will take place parallel to and in collaboration with transmediale – festival for art and
digital culture. In the weeks before the two festivals, the Vorspiel programme will unite Berlin-
based initiatives and venues in creating a city-wide programme of exhibitions, performances,
artist talks and more.
The first CTM 2020 programme announcement will be out in October, along with Early-bird
Festival Passes and the release of our 21st edition’s visual identity. Save the date!
› www.ctm-festival.de
|2|CTM 2020 THEME: LIMINAL
Liminal phenomena and liminoid states are transitional phases in which a familiar order sees its
values and symbols destabilised; norms are suspended or turned on their heads. They thrust us
into the grey zone between the two sides of a supposedly clear demarcation. We find ourselves in
ambiguous spaces, somewhere between a past that is no longer valid and an ever-becoming
future.
Liminality characterises spiritual practices and social rituals as well as aesthetic, psychedelic, and
other transformative experiences. It marks technological upheaval and social, cultural, and
political change. In music, boundary-disturbing experiences and acts of transgression are
perpetually negotiated and re-negotiated, be it through the lifestyles and identities associated
with music cultures, in practices of intoxication and of altered states closely associated with
music, its transcultural hybridity and digital fluidity, or in the multisensory experience of sound
itself.
Such liminal spaces are zones whose limits and scope remain unknown. The liminal is the
fundamental challenging of norms and identities. At the same time it is a place of heightened
sensitivity, of undirected experimentation, and of new potential communities. As such, it is a
contact zone with the "other," the unconscious, and altered forms of being, which can trigger
regenerative or transformative effects. In this respect, one can try to avoid them or actively seek
them out and engage with them. In times of crisis, we are inevitably thrust into them. It isn’t difficult
to identify the liminal nature of our present time, which is challenged on almost all fronts and
scales by far-reaching processes of transformation such as climate change, post-democracy, re-
nationalisation, globalisation, migration, hybridisation, or digitisation. All currently pressing
conflicts demand a (re)negotiation of borders and demarcations, always confirming that the old is
no longer possible and the new is not yet imaginable. The well-known and familiar no longer
promise stability or certainty, but the solutions for an encouraging future often remain out of sight,
or are only hinted towards on the horizon.
We are in between. Amidst ambivalence and perpetual shift, we drift without assurance nor
certainty. How and in what form will we emerge? What will we encounter along the way? Is there
anything beyond this liminal zone? As open liminoid experiences can appear, and as unrestricted
as liminal spaces may seem, they always remain tied to the notion of boundaries. Preoccupations
with the liminal inevitably are entangled with borders — with the existence, perception,
transgression, invalidation, and creation of demarcations of all kinds. And they prompt urgent
questions about their political utilisation and economic exploitation.
The celebration of liminality, hybridisation, and transgression is not enough in and of itself. Rather,
praise should be supplemented with critical evaluation of potentials, ambivalences, trajectories,
and exclusions. How do such experiences and practises affect political and cultural dichotomies?
When do they merely serve to reinforce known power structures and when might they actually
allow for gains in cultural freedom and permeability? Can transformative potential and the
emergence of new ideas arise through liminal experiences, and if so, can they resist co-optation
by market forces and political agendas? Can they aid nuanced self-awareness, reveal scope for
action, or enable empathetic experiences? Is it enough to practice forms of experimental politics
in a liminal space that has to make do without tangible utopias?
Entitled Liminal, CTM 2020 throws itself into limbo in hopes of stimulating a critical discussion of
our present and possible futures.
|3|Since 2014, the CTM Radio Lab has been commissioning new works that explore the intersection
of radio with live performance or installation, within the context of the festival’s yearly theme. The
initiative is led by CTM Festival and Deutschlandfunk Kultur – Radio Art / Klangkunst in
collaboration with Goethe-Institut, ORF musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst, Ö1 Kunstradio, and
The Wire magazine.
The call is open to artists worldwide and relevant to fields of experimental music, sound art, radio
art, new radio drama, and performance. The commissioned works will premiere in the form of an
installation or live performance at CTM 2020 Festival in Berlin (24 January – 2 February 2020), and
will be subsequently broadcast in Deutschlandfunk Kultur’s Klangkunst programme in spring 2020.
The Österreichischer Rundfunk (Austrian Broadcasting Service) will also present the works via one
or more of its platforms: the Ö1 Zeit-Ton or Ö1 Kunstradio shows, and/or the ORF musikprotokoll im
steirischen herbst festival in Graz (autumn 2020).
Projects must clearly explore the potentials of combining radio and live performance / installation;
proposals that simply mention the creation of a radio version following a live showing will not be
given priority. Projects must equally respond to CTM 2020’s Liminal theme in order to be eligible.
The selected works will each be awarded a 5000€ honorarium, which includes costs for any
collaborators and materials purchased to realise the work. Staging and certain production costs
may be covered on top, upon discussion with the organisers.
Application deadline: 28 August 2019 at 23:59 local Berlin time.
More information and to apply: https://www.ctm-festival.de/festival-2020/open-calls/radio-lab/
For an overview of past winners: https://www.ctm-festival.de/projects/ctm-radio-lab/
|4|In the age of digital and social media, we constantly receive multiple and often contradicting
streams of information that shape our increasingly complex and contested realities. The CTM
Radio Lab’s new KONTINUUM commission reflects this situation by offering a singular audio
channel to be modulated by one artist (or team of artists) over the period of one year. A new
component to the Radio Lab, KONTINUUM is a call by Deutschlandfunk Kultur, CTM Festival, and
ORF Austrian Broadcasting Service for composers, musicians, and audio producers to submit
proposals for creating a generative audio stream to be played 24/7 over the period of 365 days.
The call is open to artists with a proven experience in generative music composition and
streaming/broadcasting technology. Artists from all over the world are encouraged to apply.
The stream should have a narrative quality in the broadest sense of the term: It should refer to the
CTM 2020 “Liminal” theme, and propose an artistic stance on the phenomenon of multiplicities.
Generative music, algorithmic creation, machine learning, and automation in music are also topics
that can be explored.
The stream will feature regularly on Deutschlandfunk Kultur, the cultural channel of Germany’s
national public radio. It will be broadcast whenever there is a gap in the schedule as a way to
break from news, talks, radio dramas, documentaries, and music, onto a different but ever-present
sonic reality. The piece should follow its own agenda and aesthetics without violently disrupting
radio’s flow, much like the way in which many media we consume amalgamate into a steady
stream of information and affects.
Possible methods for generating this stream are data sonification, generative composition (digital
and/or analogue), live streaming from field microphones, durational performances, and any
combination of these. The source of the stream should be placed in Deutschlandfunk Kultur’s
Berlin radio house in order to ensure maximum stability in combination with minimal maintenance
requirements. Innovative ideas for the nature and format of the online or physical streaming
source are welcome, but the reliability of the stream is priority.
Kontinuum will start streaming in conjunction with CTM Festival 2020 (24 January – 2 February
2020), and will run throughout the year 2020. As part of the commission, the artist(s) should
present their work in the form of a talk and listening session at CTM Festival. Further artistic
presentations and formats within CTM (e.g. sound installation, performance, or similar event) may
be discussed with the organisers but are not a condition of the commission, nor guaranteed.
The selected work will be awarded a 7000€ honorarium, which includes the presentation at CTM,
and any costs related to collaborators, materials purchase, etc. Software maintenance (for the
stream) must also be covered by the artist; remote access to the computer can be provided.
Deutschlandfunk Kultur can provide a computer (Mac or PC) from which to run the stream and will
also maintain the stream.
Application deadline: 28 August 2019 at 23:59 local Berlin time.
More information and to apply: https://www.ctm-festival.de/festival-2020/open-calls/kontinuum/
|5|The Research Networking Day (RND) is an exchange platform for students and researchers from
different European graduate and postgraduate programmes traversing the fields of audio, arts,
media, design, and related theoretical disciplines. The 2020 RND edition will take place in
collaboration with UdK Berlin University of the Arts, the German Association for Music Business
and Music Culture Research (GMM), and Humboldt University.
The RND 2020 open call seeks innovative and critical submissions from all areas of study
addressing the scope of CTM 2020’s Liminal theme. We invite students and junior scholars to
present their research at an international platform that provides a good opportunity to meet
various colleagues and researchers working on related ideas. RND also provides a chance to
share your research via audio/video after the festival via CTM’s SoundCloud and YouTube
channels.
Persons pursuing higher levels of research/studies are also welcome to submit a proposal.
The selected candidates will give short presentations (10 min.) within different modules, linked by
discussion rounds and completed by a closing discussion at the end of the day. Presentations
should take place in English.
Please send your presentation proposal with an abstract of max. 200 words and a short bio to
rnd@ctm-festival.de with the subject: “RND Liminal.”
Application deadline: 30 September 2019.
The presentation programme will be announced at the end of October. Unfortunately we cannot
grant any funding for travel and accommodation, but participants will receive a CTM 2020 festival
pass.
|6|PRESS CONTACT
Guido Möbius
› guido@autopilotmusic.com
› +49 (0) 30 29002161
FESTIVAL CONTACT
CTM Festival
Veteranenstr. 21, 10119 Berlin
› contact@ctm-festival.de
› +49 (0)30 4404 1852
CTM 2019 PARTNERS & FUNDERS
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication [communication] reflects the views only of the author, and the
Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
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