Sonic Acts Biennial: Heart Rests Twice #1

The first edition of Heart Rests Twice – a curated series unfolding across five Thursday nights at murmur during Sonic Acts Biennial 2026 – focuses on looping and synthesis. The assembled artists destabilise expectations, probing the relations between the voice, matter, space, and the more-than-human. In homage to the Biennial theme, Melted for Love, the programme begins with a fiery performance – one of flames and possibility.

Eve Aboulkheir’s Pyro Voices summons a fire orchestra from alcohol-coated glass vessels, ignited and ‘played’ directly. The flames tease out singular resonant frequencies and timbres, coaxing a volatile chorus – captured, looped live, and released through the space, folding the architecture into the composition.

Dali de Saint Paul works with the voice as a site where poetics and politics meet. Using layers of FX, she blurs borders between languages, identities, and sonic registers – destabilising spatial and linguistic hierarchies, and gendered assumptions. For Des yeux qui font baisser les miens, she creates a fully improvised set that echoes the verses of Mahmoud Darwish – the Palestinian national poet who inspired the Biennial’s title.

Imvisage – the duo of Théo Fernandez and Antoine Alcaraz – find intimacy in repetition, by merging the obsessive groove of loops with the fragility of live manipulation. For this new live set, they strip production down to essentials – light sensors, drum machine, and voice – creating a delicate choreography between control and chance.

Heart Rests Twice draws together artists who work across discursive formats, composition, audiovisual performance to explore ideas of home, place, and belonging. In Amsterdam Noord, murmur’s custom-built surround sound system comes alive with vibration and conversation. Tuning into the pulse of the heartbeat – a circular rhythm – the series invites a heartfelt, hearingful mode of engagement – a way of listening that is not only receptive but relational, even transformative. The concerts will be followed by a Q&A.

The people at Sonic Acts have kindly offered a limited amount of free tickets for Subbacultcha members. Please make a reservation by sending an email to mailinglist@subbacultcha.nl with ‘Sonic Acts: Heart Rests Twice 1 ‘ in the subject line + your name in the email.

Registrations are open until 12.00 PM on weekdays.