Bernhard Gal [At]
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The Austrian artist, composer and musicologist Bernhard Gál
has become internationally known as one of the most prolific
sound artists of a younger generation. During the past ten
years Gál has created around 50 sound installations
and media art projects, combining sound, light, objects, spatial
concepts and video projections into intense and often site-specific
interdisciplinary art works. He also composes music for acoustic
instruments and electro-acoustic music, as well as performing
live as a (laptop) musician.
Born in Vienna, Austria in 1971, Gál began to nurture
his interest in music and (sound) art around 1985. After studies
at Vienna’s University of Music (Sound Engineering)
and the University of Vienna (Musicology), and a year-long
residency in New York City in 1997–98, he has focused
on his compositional and artistic activities. He runs the
record label Gromoga Records and is director of the Austrian
art organization ‘sp ce’. Together with Ernst
Reitermaier, he curates the Viennese Festival ‘Shut
up and Listen!’. Currently, Gál lives as a freelance
composer and artist in Vienna and Berlin where he also taught
sound art at the University of Arts in 2006-07.
An important aspect of his work is the combination of music
with other art forms, in solo projects as well as in collaborations,
e.g. since 1997 with the Japanese architect Yumi Kori (‘audio-architectural
installations’). As a laptop musician, Gál has
been performing live in around 150 concerts on four continents
and has worked together with musicians such as Tung Chao-Ming,
Kai Fagaschinski, Jennifer Walshe and i8u (France Jobin).
Gál's work has been presented in concerts, sound installations,
exhibitions, and radio portraits in Europe, Asia, and the
Americas. He has been invited to international music and art
festivals (including Wien Modern Vienna; MaerzMusik Berlin;
Donaueschinger Musiktage; Nuova Consonanza Rome; MATA Festival
New York; Mutek Montreal; Musicacoustica Beijing; FILE São
Paulo) and frequently gives lectures and workshops.
For his music and art projects Gál has received several
awards, including the Karl Hofer Prize Berlin 2001, an Annual
Grant from SKE-Fonds Vienna 2002, a composer fellowship from
the DAAD Artists in Berlin Programme 2003, and the Austrian
State Scholarship for Composition 2004. Bernhard Gál’s
music has been made available on more than 25 audio publications.
In 2005, the German publishing house Kehrer Verlag Heidelberg
published the comprehensive catalogue book ‘Installations’,
documenting Gál’s intermedia installations since
1999.
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www.bernhardgal.com
www.myspace.com/bernhardgal
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