As a practice-based doctoral researcher, pianist, composer and sound artist, Helen Anahita Wilson examines the development for creative possibilities of corporeal acoustemology: sonic and auditory knowledge of the body, health, and illness. Her work engages with challenging cancer narratives, sharing stories of illness and biomedical information, engaging with music from South Asia, experimental composition, improvisation, reparative listening, and life writing through sound.
Helen performed as part of the hcmf// shorts programme in 2022, presenting the world premiere of her new electronics and synths work, KRANKENHAUSFUNK and the extrinsic death receptor pathway. A sonic reimagining of the patient experience in hospitals, the piece is a reflection on her own experience of cancer treatment during the pandemic. It translates encounters with illness and treatment into music through machine sounds, field recordings, and samples from the Gayatri Mantra by Jagjit Singh and Aaj Jane Ki Zid Ni Karo by Farida Khanum – both gifted to Helen during her time in hospital.