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Travelling Artists in Times of War is an evening of sound and performance art that asks how artists can, in Howard Zinn’s terms, transcend the madness of the present while assuming their responsibilities as human beings.

On May 1, 2026, Grace Exhibition Space will host a 5 p.m. roundtable with the artists on art and mobility in the current U.S. political climate, followed at 8 p.m. by performances from them: Keiko Uenishi (Japan/USA) Katherine Liberovskaya (Canada/USA), Hraïr Hratchian (Armenia/Quebec), Soledad Coyoli with Gabrielle Couillard (Quebec/Mexico), and Zazalie Z. (Québec). The evening proposes performance as a way to reimagine listening, vulnerability, and solidarity in a time of war.

Grounded in Zinn’s insistence that the “important issues in the world are the citizens’ business,” the event invites artists to question patriotic mythologies, institutional habitus and enforced unity through experimental sound performances.

Curated by co-investigator Eric Letourneau, Quebecois intermedia artist and composer, this event is co-presented by the Musiques cachées laboratory of the l’Université du Québec à Montréal’s Groupe de recherche de médiatisation du son as part of the 2026 Interdisciplinary Encounters and supported by the Hexa_Out program.

About the Artists

Soledad Coyoli

Université du Québec à Montréal

Singer‑composer Soledad Coyoli grew up surrounded by the surrealist paintings of Leonora Carrington and Remedios Varo, her grandmother’s sculptures, the figures of La Malinche and La Llorona, the spare robot parts from her uncle’s workshop, and the sacred music her father listened to. Her sound practice draws on the tradition of Mexican song and focuses on encounters between different voices, languages, cultures, and technologies, as well as on Náhuatl identity roots (her name means “little bell” in Náhuatl). A recipient of the UNESCO‑ASCHBERG award in 2014, her music has been presented in some of Mexico’s most important cultural institutions, including the MUAC (University Museum of Contemporary Art), the Franz Mayer Museum, and the Centro de Cultura Digital in Mexico City. Since her arrival in Tiohtiá:ke/Mooniyang/Montreal, her work has taken a new direction: the voice and the body as unique, singular, and non‑reproducible territories, but also as fluid, mysterious, mutable, and collaborative materials.

Gabrielle Couillard

Student Member, Université du Québec à Montréal

After completing a Bachelor’s degree in Theatre Studies at UQAM, Gabrielle Couillard has explored live performance through sound and production, with a strong interest in designing evocative sonic spaces. She is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in research-creation in experimental media, where she combines poetry, field recording, and sound processing to create abstract sonic environments. Her practice focuses on issues of sound spatialization and immersive experience, from both technical and creative perspectives. She is also interested in the relationship between body and space through sound, informed by her lived experience of disability (Dispositif Espace‑Corps, UQAM, 2022–2023). Since 2019, she has incorporated telematic sound improvisation into her practice, collaborating with artists from Colombia, Toronto, and Montréal, particularly in online dissemination and sound performance contexts.

Hraïr Hratchian

Student Member, Université du Québec à Montréal

Since 1995, Hraïr Hratchian has developed an interdisciplinary practice combining music, performance, and experimental cinema. Founder of the Montreal rock groups De la Caucase and La Désunion, he has collaborated as a duduk player with various international artists and groups, including Einstürzende Neubauten. Since 2014, he has been creating experimental films and performing on stage in Canada, the United States, and abroad.

Katherine Liberovskaya

Artist

Katherine Liberovskaya is a Canadian intermedia artist based in New York, active in experimental video since the 1980s. She has produced numerous video works, installations, and performances shown internationally. Since 2001, her practice has focused on the intersection of moving image and sound through projections, installations, and audiovisual performances. She frequently collaborates with composers and sound artists in improvised concerts combining live video and sound, in which her visuals function as a form of “music for the eyes.” For over 22 years, she collaborated closely with composer and intermedia artist Phill Niblock on performances, videos, and installations. An active curator, she has organized Screen Compositions at Experimental Intermedia (NYC) since 2005 and OptoSonic Tea salons since 2006. She holds a PhD in artistic practice from UQAM (2014) and is currently Artistic Director of Experimental Intermedia NYC.

Keiko Uenishi

Sound Art‑i‑vist and Researcher

Keiko Uenishi is a sound artist and socio‑environmental composer, and a founding member of SHARE.nyc since 2001. Her work explores relationships between memory, auditory perception, and space within sociological, cultural, and psychological contexts. Her current research project, Partitions: Dividers, Connectors, Gray‑Zones, Neighbours in Aural Space, investigates a “para‑sphere” in which sound stimuli cross perceptual boundaries, disrupting spatial recognition, time, and interpersonal relations. Her works include Car décalé (slightly) and SOUNDLEAK: TheROOM. She has collaborated with artists including Katherine Liberovskaya, Christian Marclay, and Darryl Montgomery Hell, with whom she co‑initiated the feedback unit Emí no Izu. Her work has been presented internationally, including at the Whitney Museum of American Art, MoMA PS1, Tate Britain, and the Museu de Serralves.

Zazalie Z.

Interdisciplinary Artist

Interdisciplinary artist Zazalie Zaz (Nathalie Dion) has been active in the cultural scene for over 40 years. She works with image, sound, and language through voice, video, music, poetry, web art, and printmaking, and remains engaged across experimental music as well as visual and media arts. A recipient of grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, as well as a SOCAN scholarship, she presents her work as a singer and performer in festivals and artist‑run centres in Canada and internationally. Her projects have been presented in Spain, Italy, and Canada. She regularly collaborates on radio and music projects, including Yodel in Hi‑Fi. As a songwriter and performer, she was a member of the musical groups Nitroglycérine and Pois Z’ont Rouges, and has performed at numerous international festivals.

Published on April 15, 2026

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