Canadian-born, UK-based soprano Patricia Auchterlonie explores the playful, colourful and unexpected. A passionate performer of new, experimental and unheard music, she is fascinated with the human voice and textile media, particularly the potential for interwoven sound and thread. She is interested in teasing out the slow fermentation of making processes and what she calls risky co-making: creating new collaborative works that allow for vulnerability and experimentation.
Patricia appeared at hcmf// as part of the 2022 shorts programme alongside pianist Ben Smith, with three world premieres of Evan Johnson’s works in tow. The central piece, Del maravigliarsi (of astonishment), is a setting of excerpts from the notebook of Leonardo da Vinci – specifically his musings on the intricate, intimate, and insecure motions of the human eye. Similar themes of private rituals, gestures and quietude surfaced in loomeweight, an interdisciplinary durational performance piece Patricia brought to the 2024 festival with co-creator Hestor Dart, featuring pre-industrial, slow weaving techniques and improvised hockets exchanged between the vocalists, gradually transforming.