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Kari Watson

@kari__watson

2.9K

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Composer, Performer, Intermedia Artist
PhD Candidate @ UChicago
Lecturer @ UPenn
📍Philly & Chicago

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Artist Spotlight: Kari Watson @kari__watson + Rosie Middleton @hmrosiehm

How do we come to understand and negotiate intimacy, vulnerability, and inter/personal distance?

Kari Watson’s ‘A Grammar of Distance’ explores these questions through voice, performance and electronic sound, moving between fragments of interior and exterior worlds as it explores the idea of relationality. Created in close collaboration with mezzo-soprano Rosie Middleton, the work is driven by shared experiences related to identity, embodiment and the politics of performance on marginalised bodies.

Through electronic intervention, Watson and Middleton explore how the body can be recontextualised — and how this can shift ideas of power and agency within performance.

Presented in the industrial surroundings of Bates Mill Blending Shed, this World Premiere brings together two highly collaborative artists in a work that sits at the intersection of contemporary music, performance and electronic sound.

📅 Saturday 21 November, 3pm
📍 Bates Mill Blending Shed
🎟️ Standard £20 // Solidarity £26 // Kirklees Resident £18 // Under 30 £6

Link in bio

Photo Credit:
A Grammer of Distance (still)
Kari Watson © Ashleigh Dye
Rosie Middleton
A Grammer of Distance (still) taken in Bates Mill Arts Space by @kari__watson

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a month ago

Communicated with the aliens inside of our ear for this piece. 🌀 🐌 This hat is inspired by the cochlea, the internal structure of your ear canal. Made with leather, metal, and paint to resemble rust.
This piece was a collaboration with @kari__watson on their sound piece “Fused”
I created a synth garment for Kari that was recently performed at the @grahamfoundation through @lampodotorg
Kari takes theorist Donna Haraway’s cyborg as an origin point for the project: a figure of synthesis and hybridity, where humans and machines are enmeshed and the boundaries between body and environment are continually unsettled. Fuse makes that unsettled boundary audible, asking where the performer ends and the surrounding system begins. taken in Chicago, Illinois by @kari__watson

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excerpts from past iterations of TETHER

1. photos by Alex Halstead @halsteadshoots at Constellation, 2023

🫀TETHER is a multi-disciplinary performance
sounds by Kari Watson @kari__watson
movement by Kristen Bernier @footclaps_
visuals by Lua Borges @aka_lua

excerpts from past iterations of TETHER

2. clip from the Performing Media Festival sped up four thousand times, 2026

🫀TETHER is a multi-disciplinary performance
sounds by Kari Watson @kari__watson
movement by Kristen Bernier @footclaps_
visuals by Lua Borges @aka_lua by @kari__watson

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16 days ago

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17 days ago

Can’t wait to bring Fuse to the UK in November for a premier with Experimental Music Oxford at St John’s College!⚡️🔌🎛️

It was so exciting to make this huge wild piece made for @lampodotorg and perform it in April, I can’t wait to get back in the setup with custom wearables by @avgrannan and ceramic synthesizer stands by @paige.schlosser 🤍 also can’t wait to play a duo set with my dear friend @zackdilello to kick off the night💥

Thank you to Zack and @exmoxford for the opportunity to play, I can’t wait⚡️ photos from the Lampo premier in Chicago by @rachelsperspective 🤍

tickets are on sale now, link in bio. UK pals come out it will be a special one! taken in Oxford,UK by @kari__watson

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a month ago

Saturday sounded like this.

@tinkatonk and @kari__watson performing during Sound & Gravity at Guild Row.

The building has had several lives. We’re fond of the ones we don’t see coming.

@sound_and_gravity, you can come back anytime.

🎥 @goodhaus taken in Guild Row by @kari__watson

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a month ago

c is for contrast..

#minimalism #avantgarde #contrast #playlist #texture by @kari__watson

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Transformative playing with @kari__watson at @sound_and_gravity 2026. Thankful to Kari’s ever-curious soul and search for beauty, edge, nuance and the experimental. Thankful to visionary @reedmicj for putting Chicago and Chicago artists on the map alongside a brilliantly curated international lineup in front of some of the most curious and hungry audiences I’ve ever seen. Thankful to real-life goddess @simaamis . I wouldn’t expect less from Chicago, but it’s always nice to see it deliver :) by @kari__watson

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So excited to be a part of this years Sound and Gravity Festival alongside so many friends and legends 🔵🎻⚡️🎛️🔴

September 5, 6pm @guildrow we shred!
Venue tix and festival passes are on sale come one come all🤍

📸 by @_ash_dye_ taken in Chicago, Illinois by @kari__watson

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3 months ago

Grateful for such a beautiful time in the Swiss Alps working with beautiful musicians from @ensemble.intercontemporain conducted by @stabbygabi and @lenaoh.ye @iyca.ticino 🤍

Was an incredible experience, not just for the music, but for all the connection that came with it. Thank you @oscarbianchi @chayaczernowin7 and Michael Jarrell. Also huge thanks to @ab_musica for the tech support, and @danaborich & @mateasusic for keeping everything running.

A part of me is still there, swimming in the mountain streams🐠🏔️ taken in Ticino by @kari__watson

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A few moments from our set at @ensemblemiseen’s Mise-En Festival 06/20/2026 at Brooklyn College🎻🎛️ taken in Brooklyn, New York by @kari__watson

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4 months ago