Lou Barnell

Lou is a London-born, Sheffield dwelling self-trained neurodivergent artist, influenced by material, colour and the strangeness of the everyday. She was recently selected as one of the 2021 Oram Awards winners. Her body is a disorientated instrument and navigational tool that composes, scores, and communicates her synaesthetic experiences. Her approach to embodied listening and creating music is called ‘Live Dreaming’ which explores parallels between dream-states and musical performance. Lou merges gestural meditations with biorhythmic data, Max Msp and alchemical sculptures made from ice, bio-plastic and inks to communicate her intense, bizarre experiences of living with a learning difficulty.

In response to the pandemic, she launched IN-PROCESS on Repeater Radio. Womxn artists contribute objects, technology, and music to a collective radio archive; a ‘deep resource’ of counter-narratives and alternative histories.