Corey Smith & Tianjin Li in Toinen Kerros (Nokiantie 2-4, Helsinki)
Time: 10.3. at 19.00
Price: Pay-what-you-can
Essay on Resonance is a 50-minute solo performance by Corey Smith, a Chicago-based performance artist and composer. The work unfolds as a live essay in sound, speech, light, and shadow, exploring resonance as both a physical phenomenon and a guiding metaphor for trans embodiment.
At the center of the work is the hammered dulcimer, an American folk instrument whose particular resonant characteristics are conceptually deconstructed and electronically manipulated. The piece scaffolds itself around the dulcimer, straddling the lines between performance lecture, shadow puppet show, pop concert, and ambient musical encounter. Meaning emerges through an accumulation, as sound, body, and space begin to vibrate together.
Tianjun Li (Timjune) is a Finland-based interdisciplinary artist and musician whose practice navigates the intersections of voice, sound, image, and collective engagement. By employing a vocal range extending beyond four octaves, Li constructs speculative landscapes where more-than-human entities emerge as metaphors for complex socio-ecological realities.
In recent projects, Li synthesizes extended vocal techniques with moving imagery to establish a resonant, multisensory environment. Bird-song motifs and layered choral textures interact with projected visuals, allowing the human voice to coalesce with non-human presences, exploring the fluid boundaries between organic sound and shifting ecological narratives, transforming the performance into a space of immersive transformation.
