The Portuguese sound artist based in Barcelona will headline a new session of the Sono·lab series at Las Naves on Thursday, November 19, with an electroacoustic performance created live using everyday objects, motors, springs, and analog devices.

The Super·lab series, organized by Sono·lab—the sound research laboratory of València Innovation Capital, a division of the City of Valencia—will hold its 27th edition next Thursday, November 19, at 7:15 p.m., at Las Naves, featuring sound artist, composer, and sound poet Alfredo Costa Monteiro.

Based in Barcelona since 1992, Costa Monteiro has an extensive international career that bridges sound experimentation, the visual arts, and poetry. On this occasion, he will present an electroacoustic set in which small motors, amplified springs, resonant objects, and feedback generated via a mixing console become instruments for a live exploration of sound.

His approach is rooted in an intuitive and direct relationship with analog electronics. Each sound arises from an action or gesture that sets objects into resonance, giving rise to unpredictable combinations. The result is an ever-changing experience, in which the space does not function merely as a venue for performance but actively shapes the sound.

Alfredo Costa Monteiro: Between Sound Experimentation and Poetry

Born in Porto in 1964, Alfredo Costa Monteiro trained in sculpture and multimedia at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he studied with Christian Boltanski. Throughout his career, he has developed a unique language that combines sound art, visual creation, and sound poetry, exploring the limits of acoustic perception: from virtually inaudible compositions to high-intensity performances.

His work incorporates prepared instruments and everyday objects transformed into musical instruments. Prepared accordions and guitars, record players, synthesizers, and electroacoustic devices are part of a creative universe in which experimentation with materials and the possibilities of sound takes center stage.

In the field of sound poetry, she explores the musicality and phonetics of language through multilingual compositions that play with sounds and the various meanings of words. In 2017, she received the Palma Ars Acústica International Prize for her radio work *Fragments of an Unfinished Story*. In 2022, she founded Mont Efímer, an independent publishing house dedicated to sound and visual poetry.

He has an extensive discography released on international labels such as Antifrost, Rossbin, Absurd, Another Timbre, Creative Sources, Ftarri/Hitorri, Potlatch, Entr’acte, and Mikroton, both as a solo artist and as part of various ensembles. His work has been presented in numerous countries across Europe, North America, Mexico, and Japan, and he has collaborated with sound artists, musicians, filmmakers, choreographers, and video artists on the international scene.

Live electronic music that engages with the space

The project Costa Monteiro presents at Super·lab is the result of more than twenty years of research and interaction with the elements that make up his unique electroacoustic system. His approach is analog, intuitive, and direct: small devices and objects are activated in different configurations during each performance, generating a repertoire of sonic possibilities that never repeats exactly the same way.

Space plays a fundamental role in these performances. Each concert is prepared with its specific characteristics in mind, since the environment not only receives the sound but also modifies it, both acoustically and psychologically. The sound experience is thus conceived more as a matter of perception and inference than of representation.

Over the years, this piece has taken on different titles depending on the context and the venue where it has been performed, such as *Anéis de fogo*, *Deceleración*, *A halo of light surrounded by darkness*, *Shock Wave*, *Rarefacció*, or *Indivisibilidad*.

Sono·lab, a space for sound experimentation

With this new edition, Super·lab continues to bring relevant projects and artists in the field of contemporary sound creation to Valencia, creating a space where experimentation, research, and listening come together.

The series is part of the activities associated with Super·Sonic: Francisco López Collection of Experimental Music and Audio Art and is part of the Valencia City Council’s “València Music City” strategy, helping to strengthen the city’s role as a hub for contemporary sound creation and the intersection of art, technology, and cultural innovation.