Free Event
Natalie Hyacinth (UK, 1987)
After The End of The World (2025) 15’ World Premiere
“It’s after the end of the world, don’t you know that yet?” chants June Tyson, opening Sun Ra’s 1973 jazz masterpiece, Space is the Place, with a proclamation of a radical ideal: another, alternate world might not only be possible, but may already be here.
Presented at hcmf// 2025 in both installation and live performance formats, Natalie Hyacinth’s After The End of The World is inspired by Space is the Place, taking the end as a starting point for flourishing imagination, possibility and openings.
Intended as an ongoing sonic reflection on the current state of things in the world, with climate catastrophe, rising division and conflict in our midst, Hyacinth’s new work invites us to ponder: how does it feel to live at the end of the world? Beginning with the sound of a conk shell recorded in St Lucia, where sea level rises and increasingly unpredictable weather trends signal a visceral end of world reality for people living on the shores, the installation seeks to spotlight the voices and sounds of those living on the edge – both of the world and extinction – and the ways in which we can collectively rebuild from the margins.
After The End of The World is a sonic alarm to locate and revive hope and warmth within the ashes.
After the End of the World: The Listening Room
Wednesday 26 November, 11am – 4pm (Frances and Natalie in conversation: 3pm), AMPED Coffee, 29 Queensgate, Huddersfield HD1 2RD
A space for listening, reflection and conversation inspired by Natalie Hyacinth’s installation and performance After The End of The World. Throughout Wednesday 26 November, you can listen to a continuous mix of music, sound and text selected by composer and sound artist Natalie Hyacinth, writer and researcher Frances Morgan, and participants and friends of the Sonic Cyberfeminisms project, in response to the themes of climate catastrophe, conflict, hope and collective rebuilding addressed in Hyacinth’s work.
Produced and presented by hcmf// in partnership with Nordic Music Days and Ultima Oslo Contemporary Music Festival as part of the Sustainable Composition & Creative Sound Practices programme supported by Arts Council England, Danish Arts Foundation, Arts Council Norway and Julie’s Bicycle via the International Touring and Environmental Responsibility Fund; also supported by Hinrichsen Foundation and Vaughan Williams Foundation
Sustainable Composition & Creative Sound Practices is part of The Current Climate
Getting There
Venue: Phipps Hall (Second Floor, Richard Steinitz Building)
Accessibility: Accessibility information is available here. Further information on campus accessibility is available on the University of Huddersfield website.
What three words: ///opera.flock.anyone
Address: Queensgate, England, HD1 3DH, United Kingdom.