Deadline: September 30, 2023
Applications for the Sound Walk September Award 2023 are now open. The Sound Walk September Awards celebrate the skills of those composing audio, listening, and sound walks. The competition is open to anyone.
The submission needs to be a ‘sound walk’. A sound walk, or walking piece, is any walk that focuses on listening to the environment, with or without the use of technology, or adds to the experience through the use of sound or voice. This can include a scripted or choreographed score or work that has additional audio elements. The award is deliberately left as open as possible to encourage creativity.
Award
- Soundwalks that make it to the shortlist get bragging rights.
- Winners and honourable mentions receive a physical award. In addition, winners receive a cash prize of 250 euros, honourable mentions receive a cash prize of 100 euros.
Eligibility
- Any walking piece of any duration created during the previous 12 months, after the end of the previous year’s Sound Walk September, and submitted to the walk · listen · create website, is eligible.
- Work can include a variety of formats, approaches, and subjects, from a wide range of creative disciplines, including arts, heritage and history, health and wellbeing, social practices, journalism, performance, literature and theatre, ecology, tourism, and more.
- Pieces by members of the Grand Jury, and pieces by the founders of WLC can be shortlisted, but can neither win, nor receive a honourable mention. Members of the Grand Jury are asked to excuse themselves from voting on pieces they have been involved in, but are not listed as one of the creators.
Judging Criteria
The Online Jury and Grand Jury review submitted soundwalks against the following criteria:
- Engaging, challenging, or deepening. The work is engaging, and challenges, or deepens, our understanding of sound, place, mobility, or form.
- Relevant. The work addresses critical current issues, urgent contemporary discussion, or new research. This could mean that it addresses moral issues, it stretches the consumer’s imagination, or it is well described.
- Production quality. The sound has high fidelity, that is, the audio is of ‘good’ quality. Visuals, if used, amplify the aims of the audio content.
- Locative. Site, or location, is intrinsic to the work.
- Insightful. The work reveals new information, unheard voices, hidden audio texts, untold histories, etc.
- Accessible. The work is accessible, has a low barrier to access, for individuals with different mobilities.
- Usability. The work is easy to use, the interface is straightforward to understand.
Application
For more information, visit Sound Walk September Award.
