A Film by Aura Satz
2024, 89mins, UK / Finland, 4K
In an age of intersecting political, man-made and ecological disasters, ‘Preemptive Listening’ is an ode to the sirens that are and those that could be. Siren compositions from over 20 collaborators form a resonant voice to ask; Does an alarm have to be alarming?
‘Preemptive Listening’ is a work of non-fiction cinema which re-imagines sirens in order to forge a new understanding of present and long term emergency. The siren serves as a worldwide cipher of potential trauma, an emblem warning of climate catastrophe, a mouthpiece for sonic governance and crisis management. Many sirens are relics from WW2 and the Cold War, repurposed to communicate the threats of extreme weather, a collective commemorative pause, or resurrected to test disaster preparedness.
Through a soundtrack of new siren sounds composed by an array of experimental musicians, the film asks: Does an alarm have to be alarming? How can we counter alarm fatigue, both as a lived reality and as a metaphor for our current state? Can we envision sounds not only scored to immediacy, but signals set to a longer temporal frame, sounding the alarm for the distant future, the cries on the cusp of ecological catastrophe? Can we imagine sirens beyond the human? The soundtrack features the endlessly escalating sounds of planetary data; animal howls and the grief of extinction; soaring banshee-like warnings; defiant trumpets; intricate harp permutations; the sounds of the earth’s core. The film posits the siren’s loud glissando wail as a conditioned and learned signal, one that can potentially be rewired.
Featuring newly composed sirens by (in order of appearance)
Laurie Spiegel, Evelyn Glennie, Maja S. K. Ratkje, Anton Lukoszevieze, BJ Nilsen, Ilpo Väisänen, Rhodri Davies, Mazen Kerbaj, FUJ||||||||||TA, Sarah Davachi, David Toop, Christina Kubisch, Moor Mother, Raven Chacon, Elaine Mitchener, Camille Norment, Horomona Horo, Debit, Kode9.
and spoken by
Khalid Abdalla, Daphne Carr, Asantewaa Boykin and Niki Jones, Erin Matariki Carr, Arturo Escobar.
Directed, written and edited by Aura Satz.
Producers: LONO Studio – Luke W Moody, Aura Satz
Associate Producers: Tendai John Mutambu, Mika Taanila and Jussi Eerola (Testifilmi).
Aura Satz (born 1974, Barcelona) is a London-based artist based who works with film, sound, performance and sculpture. Her works explore a distributed, expanded and shared notion of voice, and are made in conversation, using dialogue as both method and subject matter. Satz has made several film portraits of listening and compositional practices as well as works centred on sound technology and unusual notation systems. ‘Preemptive Listening’ is her first feature, with support from an artist’s residencies at Walker Arts Centre and EMPAC, and funded by an AHRC fellowship hosted at the Royal College of Art.
She has performed, exhibited and screened her work internationally, including Tate Modern, BFI Southbank, Hayward Gallery, Sydney Biennale, NTT InterCommunication Center Tokyo, High Line Art NY, the Rotterdam Film Festival, MoMA NY, Sharjah Art Foundation, Kadist San Francisco, Onassis Stegi, and Sonic Acts. She has presented solo exhibitions at the Wellcome Collection; the Hayward Gallery project space; John Hansard Gallery; George Eastman Museum; Dallas Contemporary; ARTIUM, Museo Vasco de Arte Contemporáneo; Kunstnernes Hus; as well as special screening programmes at the Rotterdam Film Festival, The New York Film Festival, Tate Britain, Whitechapel Gallery and more. Her films are distributed by LUX.