credit: Sound Design

Interludes: Black Balloons is a new sound installation by Shade Podcast and Axel Kacoutié now showing at Tate Gallery. Responding to Liz Johnson Artur’s display Time don’t run here, the piece references Artur’s Black Lives Matter protest images and works from her ongoing Black Balloon Archive documenting people in Africa, and of the African and Caribbean diasporas.

Experience Liz Johnson Artur’s work with the ear and body. How does sound change how you see the works? What pulses through you when you see the images, braille and thread?

The soundscape features the voices of Liz Johnson Artur, artists Imogen Faires and Jamel Alatise from Theatre Peckham, and Research and Interpretation Artist Resident, Marie Smith. It includes extracts from Poetry as Protest, Protest as Poetry, a poem by Faires and Alatise responding to the display and performed live at Tate Modern in April 2023.

Visit the installation at Tate Modern, Natalie Bell Building, Level 2 West Room 4, Artist and Society. Black Balloons will play in the gallery at the following times: 11.00am, 12.00pm, 1.00pm, 3.00pm, 4.00pm, 5.00pm.

Interludes is an ongoing sound collaboration between Lou Mensah of Shade Podcast and the audio artist Axel Kacoutié.

Produced by Lou Mensah

Created by Axel Kacoutié

A psychological and spiritual withdrawal from the toxic workplace culture founded on white supremacy.

Original image by Irene Tønnessen

From the Fugitive Episode. Series 34

Curated by Axel Kacoutié, Eleanor McDowall and Andrea Rangecroft
Produced by Axel Kacoutié
Executive Producer: Alan Hall
A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4

It’s not always in a romantic relationship where a heart can break.

How do we grieve in a culture that champions one love over the rest?

Axel Kacoutié attempts to language loss after reuniting with the person who inspired this documentary. Guided by the thoughts and wisdom of friends and an end-of-life practitioner, we hear what happens when we let grief speak.

Featuring the voices of Claire Galligan, Ivor Williams, JN Benjamin, Tej Adeleye, Weyland McKenzie-Witter and Zachary Cayenne-Elliott.

Special thanks to End of Life Doula UK, Tony Phillips, Natasha McAnea-Hill, Jeff Monteen and Maz Ebtehaj

Artwork: Erin Tse
Development Producer: Eleanor McDowall
Sound Design, Music and Mixing Production: Axel Kacoutié
Produced by Axel Kacoutié

A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4

A memoryscape of fatherhood woven between three generations.

From the Fatherhood Episode. Series 33.

Curated by Axel Kacoutié, Eleanor McDowall and Andrea Rangecroft
Produced and mixed by Axel Kacoutié
A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4

“Somewhere between the narrow entry of Who I am and What I seem to be, lies a vast and nameless place.”

In this transmission, Axel Kacoutié discovers a new sense of self in the cosmologies, concepts and realities of queer and indigenous folks. What are the links between gender expression and our relationship with the Earth? How does it destabilise colonial and capitalist imaginations of what we’re told a gender binary is meant to be?

Featuring the voices of:
Opaskwayak Cree Nation Professor at the University of Saskatchewan, Dr Alex Wilson
Artist Buitumelo Kotekwa
Afro-Taino Two-Spirit change-maker Cleopatra Tatabele
Scholar and Research Assistant Karyn De Freitas
Transmasculine, non-binary scholar and Founder of the Free Black University, Melz Owusu.

Artwork by Erin Tse

Development Producer: Eleanor McDowall
Assistant Producer: CA Davis
Additional Recording: Heidi Chang and Israel Ramjohn
Sound Design, Music and Mixing Production: Axel Kacoutié
Produced by Axel Kacoutié
A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio 4

Listen & subscribe to the whole podcast series

Interludes is a collaboration between Shade Podcast and Axel Kacoutié featuring six contemporary artists: Amy Sherald, Ming Smith, Phoebe Boswell, Rahima Gambo, Nnena Kalu and Cassi Namoda.

Framed by the question “What does healing sound like?”, these podcasts offer a visceral connection with the artists’ work. In each episode we weave the artists’ reflections through Axel’s original soundscapes, as a collaborative exploration of their creative experience.

Interludes opens an alternative space. The aim is to soften our tendency to intellectualise artwork, and instead create a sonic texture that is more intimate in its connection with the artist.

Concept & Production by Lou Mensah
Created by Axel Kacoutié

Supported by Hauser & Wirth
Artwork by Erin Tse
Animated by Luke Dye-Montefiore

Supported by Frieze Membership

John, constantly stepped on as one of society’s rank and file, decides he will claim the silver spoon from the metropolitan elite

He tries to blend in, presenting himself as someone who dresses well, someone who belongs. Sunny however, who’s born into wealth, sees through his disguise. With that, any hopes John has of being welcomed with open arms vanishes.

That evening at Sunny’s apartment, Sunny and her boyfriend Tom host a gathering. Drinks flow, intellectual conversations about nothing, life is good. Outside the apartment however, John and others like him desperately search for an opening to access the apartment. As one of the guests arrives late, it creates the perfect opportunity, allowing John and the other to make their way in.

Blissfully unaware until it’s too late, Sunny, Tom and the others soon find themselves relegated to the status of the guests in their own home as John is finally able to enjoy the finer things in life.

 

Directed by Ajuán Isaac-George
Score by Ioana Selaru

Decode returns for a second series to go deep inside another iconic UK rap album, track by track, week by week, line by line, beat by beat. What masterpiece is being dissected this time? Say hello to Skepta’s award-winning Konnichiwa, from 2016. Hosted by Kayo Chingonyi. A Reduced Listening Production for Spotify Studios UK.

Music composition for the 20 year anniversary of adidas’ Y-3 campaign

Chapter 1

Chapter 1.5 feat Ioana Selaru

Production Credits:

Photography: Gabriel Moses
Creative Direction: Jamie Reid
Styling: Robbie Spencer
Movement Director: Blackhaine
Makeup: Nami Yoshida
Hair: Kiyoko Odo
Casting: Sarah Small
Set Design: Samuel Overs

Groomer: Nao Gayoso
Retouch: Studio Private

Editor: Joseph Taylor (The Assembly Rooms)
Colourist: Adam Kaniowski (Grain Post Production)
Online Editor : Matthew Blacklock
Online Editor: Otis Tree

Talent: Zinedine Zidane, Joe Grey Adams, @invuharry, Marcelo Zhang, Max Cookward, Ratiba Ayadi, Isabel Phua, Nandi

Production: Farago Projects