EXPLORING MULTISENSORY ENCOUNTERS WITH URGENT IDEAS,
CONTEMPORARY ART & EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC.

19.09 — 22.09.2024

VARIOUS LOCATIONS

ROTTERDAM (NL)

Conflux is a festival exploring multisensory encounters, urgent ideas, contemporary art and experimental music.

Happening across various locations throughout Rotterdam from September 19 – 22, 2024, Conflux invites you to experience a program of audiovisual performances, public art interventions, multimedia commissions, experimental club nights and talks reflecting on the festival theme 'Symbiotic Realities'.

Discover

  • Performances

    At the heart of Conflux Festival lies an exploration of the intricate connections between art, music, and human sensory perception, reflecting this year’s theme, "Symbiotic Realities." Over four days, the festival's performance programme invites artists to investigate how sound and light shape our experience of reality and interact with our bodies and minds. The program is a dynamic fusion of cutting-edge sound performances, live audiovisual acts, and expanded cinema projects by internationally acclaimed artists, transforming a variety of unique locations across Rotterdam.

    Opening with a free concert at Plein 1940 on Thursday, September 19th, Conflux begins its journey into new sensory realms, inviting the audience to experience how art can create new forms of interaction between humans, technology, and the environment. On Friday and Saturday, the festival moves to Brutus, where the raw and industrial space will serve as a backdrop for performances that merge the image and sound, exploring how technology can both amplify and transform human perception. The program culminates on Sunday, September 22nd, at WORM, within an intimate setting the festival aims to immerse audiences in a deep, sensory dialogue that blurs the boundaries between the natural and the artificial, the digital and the physical.

    Artists

    Click on names for more info

    Casimir Geelhoed & Anni Nöps
    Line-AV 2.0 performance | Thu 19 at Plein 1940
    Zalán Szakács & Teresa Winter
    Lichtspiel: Ars Anaclastica | Thu 19 at Plein 1940
    Alberta Balsam
    Line-AV 2.0 performance | Thu 19 at Plein 1940
    Sara Persico
    Fri 20 at Brutus
    feedbacksociety
    BrKpCm | Fri 20 at Brutus
    Roly Porter
    Fri 20 at Brutus
    Zohar & Jeisson Drenth
    Hybrid AV performance | Fri 20 at Brutus
    Fronte Vacuo
    MμRMUR: The Deer | Sat 21 at Brutus
    Edwin van der Heide
    LSP | Sat 21 at Brutus
    Resina
    Sat 21 at Brutus
    Heleen Blanken & Aho Ssan
    Sat 21 at Brutus
    C. Lavender
    Sun 22 at WORM
    Marco Broeders & Julian Edwardes
    The Open Loop | Sun 22 at WORM
  • Exhibition

    Perception is a vital conduit between the external world and our inner experience, shaping the very foundation of how we understand and construct reality. At the Conflux Festival, the exhibition invites artists to explore and challenge these processes by presenting works that offer alternative views on how our sensory systems mediate and sometimes distort our relationship with the world around us. Through abstract fields of light, immersive soundscapes, dynamic video patterns, and innovative interventions, the artists reimagine the boundaries of perception, reflecting on the festival's theme, "Symbiotic Realities."

    "Symbiotic Realities" calls for a deeper reflection on the interconnectedness between human consciousness, technology, and the environment, suggesting that reality is not a fixed concept but a fluid and evolving experience shaped by myriad forces. In this spirit, the exhibition serves as a laboratory for sensory experimentation, where the audience is invited to experience how perception itself can be stretched, reconfigured, or augmented, forging new connections between the organic and the digital, the natural and the constructed.

    Hosted at Katoenhuis, a multifunctional hub for immersive experiences and technology, the exhibition will be open from Friday afternoon, September 20th, through Sunday evening, September 22nd. Visitors will find themselves immersed in a series of experimental light- and soundinstallations and artworks that challenge conventional ideas about how we perceive reality, encouraging them to engage actively with the sensory interplay that defines our existence in an increasingly interconnected world.

    Artists

    Click on names for more info

    Jeroen Alexander Meijer
    The Pendulum Always Swings Back to Stillness | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Renzo van Steenbergen & Kristjan Pütsep
    Portaal | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Macular
    Line-AV 2.0 | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Mariska de Groot & Dieter Vandoren
    LFS2 | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Sabrina Ratté
    Floralia (adapted version for SVNSCRNS) | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Nicky Assmann & Joris Strijbos
    Parallel Strata | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Mint Park
    Composition for Line-AV 2.0 | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Klara Ravat & Saåad
    A-Hora | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Alberta Balsam
    Composition for Line-AV 2.0 | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
    Fronte Vacuo
    MμRMUR: The Deer | Fri 20 at Katoenhuis
  • Club Night

    For the first time, Conflux Festival 2024 partners with Perron to delve into the nocturnal reality of contemporary club culture with a techno-driven Saturday night programme. This event reimagines the club as a modern urban ritual, a space where boundaries blur and music becomes a medium for collective transcendence.

    Expect a night where sensory experiences and audiovisual elements are unleashed on the dance floor, reshaping the club environment into a dynamic space of connection, transformation, and sonic explorations.

    The event features performances by internationally renowned artists who specialize in blending otherworldly soundscapes with cutting-edge rhythmical structures, creating a sonic laboratory that dissolves the barriers between self and other, reality and imagination.

    In this way, club night becomes more than just a party - it evolves into an essential ritual for contemporary urban life. In a world often fragmented by technology and isolation, the event provides a haven for collective expression, where music, light and movement weave new forms of interconnectedness and understanding. Through this shared, ephemeral experience, “Symbiotic Realities” comes alive, demonstrating how nightlife can serve as a powerful counterpoint to the complexities of the digital age by bringing people together in moments of ecstatic unity.

    Artists

    Click on names for more info

    DJ Shahmaran
    Sat 00:00 at Perron
    NVST
    Sat 01:15 at Perron
    Legowelt
    Sat 02:30 at Perron
    Nkisi
    Sat 03:30 at Perron
    Talismann
    Sat 04:30 at Perron
  • Conference

    Amid ongoing and expanding conflicts between humans, nature, and machines, Conflux Festival once again aims to serve as a platform for envisioning new models of coexistence and synergy. It seeks to develop symbiotic techno-natural ecosystems that respect diverse modes of understanding and critically engage in conversations about them.

    Conflux Festival 2024's conference programme gathers thinkers, theorists, artists, and performers from the festival to reflect on the theme of Symbiotic Realities. With a special focus on the interconnected nature of perception and reality, the conference presents alternate ways of understanding our diverse and interdependent world, highlighting the symbiotic relationships between humans, machines, plants, and animals. Along the keynote speakers Bogna Konior, Thomas Moynihan and Tessa Verhoef, there will be artist talks by Lavender Suarez, Heleen Blanken and Zalán Szakács.

    The one-day conference programme will be happening on Saturday 21 September at Debatpodium Arminius.

    Artists

    Click on names for more info

    Eric Parren (moderator)
    Sat 21 at Arminius
    Cecile van Bruggen (moderator)
    Sat 21 at Arminius
    Heleen Blanken (artist talk)
    Sat 21 at Arminius
    Bogna Konior
    Sat 21 at Arminius
    Peter van der Putten & Maarten Lamers, supported by Daniel Simu
    Sat 21 at Arminius
    Zalán Szakács (artist talk)
    Sat 21 at Arminius
    Thomas Moynihan
    Sat 21 at Arminius
    Lavender Suarez (artist talk)
    Sat 21 at Arminius