In accordance with its statutes the foundation sponsors projects of cultural excellence and events which enhance the prestige and international importance of the City of Bonn as a city of culture, and especially as the birthplace of the composer Ludwig van Beethoven. Priority will be given to projects which accompany and supplement the Beethoven Festival Bonn. According to the guidelines adopted by the Board of Trustees the sponsored projects should be expected to meet with an extraordinary response, be supportive of international co-operation and make a significant contribution to the attractiveness of Bonn as the seat of international organisations and as a congress location.
The foundation also sponsors projects and events of individual artists, groups of artists and cultural institutions (museums etc.) from the entire spectrum of arts and culture. Projects should be clearly and unmistakably related to Bonn; national and international co-productions are nonetheless welcome.
ECHOES - Soundforum Bonn
echoes – soundforum bonn has been combining artistic and scientific research and artistic practice since 2022. In close cooperation with a Bonn-based and an international scientific institution, sound artists engage in dialog with scientists on topics such as biodiversity, sustainability, society and the destruction of nature.
A research trip by sound artists and scientists to an annually selected region of the world and an artistic residency in exchange with local scientists form the basis for the development and presentation of new sound art works both in Bonn and at the locations of the partner institutions.
In the first year, Bonn City Sound Artist 2022 Robin Minard researched the sounds and living conditions of frogs in the rainforest together with biologists from Museum Koenig in Bonn and the University of Santa Marta in Colombia. In the following year, the two Bonn City Sound Artists Roswitha von den Driesch and Jens-Uwe Dyffort investigated the development of plants in the extremely arid regions of the Atacama Desert in Chile with biologists from the Nees Institute at the University of Bonn and the CRC1211 international research network.
The central theme of echoes – soundforum bonn 2024 is the role of sound and music in communities.
For this year’s project, artists Miki Yui and Stefan Schneider, who live and work in Düsseldorf, have been appointed City Sound Artists Bonn 2024 by the Beethoven Foundation. In close collaboration with researchers from the Institute of Linguistics, Media and Musicology at the University of Bonn and the University of Cape Coast (Ghana), the two will focus on the West African country of Ghana, partly because of the central role of communal thinking and action in the local traditional music cultures there. After two research residencies in Ghana, Miki Yui and Stefan Schneider will first present their artistic results in Cape Coast, Bonn’s project partner city. After that, they will develop a larger artistic project, which they will present in September 2024 at the Beethovenfest in Bonn.