Have you ever experienced a situation where your performance did not go according to plan?

Perhaps, the instrument you built broke or caught fire on stage, the soundperson hated you, or you were just too nervous to perform well...

If the answer to the question above is “yes”, “maybe” or “it surely felt that way” then you might be interested in contributing to our initiative.

We are an international group of artists/researchers in the field of multimedia arts, experimental music and instrument building based in the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (GZ).

We are working on a project that focuses on Failed Performances with idiosyncratic setups (self-built instruments, new interfaces, or any other bespoke musical systems and contraptions) with the working title No-gos Interruptions Malfunctions and Errors.

To this end, we are collecting stories and anecdotes from the community regarding instruments and performances that failed, broke, remained silent or misbehaved on stage.

We do not attempt to give a universal definition of what “failure” in experimental performance context exactly is, rather, we are interested in the performers’ subjective perspectives. We prioritize the human experience, but we are not excluding other factors such as organizational or technical failures, non-human agency or supernatural phenomena.

If you are interested in participating in such initiative, please send us:

- A written account of a performance that you consider as a failure (we recommend 300 to 800 words)
- The level of details and stylistic choices are at author’s discretion
- One word that, in your opinion, captures the essence of the story
- Optional: Photo\video documentation of the story

Send the materials mentioned above to [email protected] before February 25th

The final project will take the form of a printed zine (and a pdf document) with submissions arranged alphabetically from A-to-Z, according to the keyword that the authors provided. We reserve the right to use a synonym to the word of your choosing for indexing purposes, e.g. disaster [also catastrophe].

The authors' identities will be anonymous by default, unless authors explicitly request i to show their name or an alias. The stories will be presented verbatim; cases where edits are needed will be indicated in the text.

The zine will be distributed free of charge through venues and organizations interested.

For more information please visit - https://
chihauccisoilconte.eu/noinmaer
and feel free to get in touch if you have any questions

We look forward to reading your tragic stories,

The No-Gos, Incidents, Malfunctions and Errors Team #opencall #callforartists #experimentalmusic #newmusic
#soundart #mediaart #multimediaart #instrumentbuilding
#diyinstruments #failedperformance #performanceart
#noiseart #sonicart #artandresearch #artistresearcher
#zineproject #independentpublishing #criticalpractice