Hugo Paquete - Sonic Media Artist Creating Post-Digital Sound Art and Immersive Installations
Post-Digital Sonic Media Art: Composing Systems of Resistance through Sound
Post-Digital Sonic Media Art: Composing Systems of Resistance through Sound
Hugo Paquete, PhD is a research-based sonic media artist, composer, and academic whose transdisciplinary practice investigates the technological unconscious, the latent infrastructures, energetic flows, and computational codes that shape perception, embodiment, and social life.
Central to his methodology are the concepts of micro-sound and maximum sound, articulated through strategies of algorithmic sabotage: the hacking and repurposing of biometric data, satellite tracking, electromagnetic fields, and generative algorithms. This approach mobilizes glitch, entropy, and systemic collapse not as errors but as aesthetic and epistemic events, producing what Paquete terms epistemic listening, a way of generating new knowledge through sound.
His research operates at the intersection of critical sound studies, media archaeology, and post-techno aesthetics, constructing cybernetic ecologies where human and non-human agents intra-act. In these environments, sound functions as both a forensic tool for dissecting hidden techno-social structures and as a speculative system for reimagining cultural and perceptual conditions in the 21st century.
Theoretical and Methodological Approach
Hugo Paquete is a research-based media artist, composer, and academic whose transdisciplinary practice investigates the technological unconscious, the latent systems, infrastructures, and computational codes that shape contemporary perception and social life. His work operates at the intersection of critical sound studies, media archaeology, and post-digital aesthetics, advancing a methodology where sound functions as both a forensic tool for dissecting hidden techno-social structures and an epistemic system for generating new knowledge.
Paquete’s research-creation articulates a distinctive synthesis of critical theory, sonic materialism, and experimental media practice. Informed by agential realism and vibrational ontology, his work examines how sound and technology co-constitute perceptual, political, and ontological conditions. This inquiry is realized through hands-on technological experimentation, where infrastructures, data systems, and obsolete devices are re-engineered to produce speculative sonic ecologies. Within these constructed environments, glitch, failure, and entropy are deployed as deliberate strategies to expose the fragility and politics embedded in technological systems, reframing listening as a critical and political practice.
Conceptual Frameworks Approach
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Post-Techno Aesthetic – Extending beyond the cultural and rhythmic legacies of techno, this framework mobilizes vibration, rhythm, and noise as infrastructures of speculative thought. Post-techno operates simultaneously as an aesthetic strategy and a political gesture, resonating with subcultural and dissident traditions that use sound as a form of resistance. From the underground genealogies of rave and club culture to the critical imaginaries of cyberpunk and technoculture, Paquete’s post-techno practice questions how sonic intensities generate embodied knowledge, collective agency, and alternative temporalities.
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Post-Digital Aesthetic – A critical stance that moves beyond the seamless surface of digital culture, foregrounding noise, imperfection, and technological residue as sites of resistance, memory, and critique. By embracing error, glitch, and obsolescence, this approach reclaims the hidden materialities of digital systems and destabilizes their ideological transparency.
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Media-Archaeological Practice – Excavating and sonifying obsolete infrastructures in order to interrogate processes of obsolescence, memory, and erasure in media systems. By reanimating forgotten technologies, Paquete disrupts the linear narrative of progress, proposing instead a critical archaeology of sound and media that exposes how infrastructures persist as spectral, political, and cultural residues.
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Biopolitical Sonification – Rendering audible the infrastructures of control and care inscribed in biometric and clinical data, exposing how bodies are regulated and monitored through technological mediation. At the same time, this framework intersects with the aesthetics of subcultural and dissident groups, from cyberpunk imaginaries to technocultural practices, which historically mobilize sound against regimes of surveillance and normalization. Here, noise, distortion, and rhythm operate not only as aesthetic strategies but also as tools of dissent, challenging how power inscribes itself into corporeality while opening speculative and collective modes of listening.
- Spatialized Listening – Designing immersive architectures where sound distributes agency across human and non-human actors, destabilizing anthropocentric listening positions. Through spatial and vibrational diffusion, this framework cultivates distributed modes of perception in which sound is no longer a medium to be consumed but an environment that reorganizes relational ecologies between bodies, technologies, and spaces.
A Multilevel Ontology of Sound
Central to these frameworks is a multilevel ontology of sound, exploring a spectrum from minimum sound (micro-perceptual, vibrational phenomena) to maximum sound (saturated, immersive intensities). This spectrum serves as a methodological tool for probing how vibration reorganizes perception, reveals hidden infrastructures, and generates new aesthetic-political imaginaries.
Through this constellation of approaches, Paquete’s research contributes to the fields of artistic research, sound studies, and post-digital aesthetics, advancing a methodology that is at once speculative, critical, and materially grounded. His practice positions sound as a political medium and subcultural force, a way of engaging with infrastructures, resisting dominant technological paradigms, and proposing alternative modes of listening, sensing, and inhabiting technologically saturated worlds.
Academic Appointements and Research Infrastructures
Hugo Paquete is a media artist, composer, and academic whose transdisciplinary practice bridges critical sound studies, media archaeology, and post-digital aesthetics. He serves as Adjunct Professor at the School of Education and Communication, University of Algarve, and is an integrated researcher at the Research Centre for Arts and Communication (CIAC), where he contributes to the development of experimental methodologies in artistic research and media theory.
Paquete is the founder and director of Absonus Lab, a platform for speculative sonic media affiliated with the European Media Art Platform (EMAP) and the Anna Lindh Foundation. His work at CIAC complements this initiative, advancing research-creation strategies that interrogate the technological unconscious and the politics of infrastructure through sound.
He collaborates with iAlab Sensoria (University of Beira Interior) and the Biofeedback Art Research Network (BARN), extending his inquiry into embodied technologies and interdisciplinary intersections between art and science. His academic trajectory includes a PhD in Digital Media Art (Universidade Aberta/University of Algarve, 2022), alongside advanced studies in Musical Sciences (NOVA University Lisbon), Master in Contemporary Artistic Creation (University of Aveiro), and Deegre in Fine Arts (ESAD Caldas da Rainha).
Research Output and Key Contributions
Hugo Paquete’s artistic research unfolds across installations, performances, and publications, presented in leading international contexts such as Ars Electronica, ZKM | Hertz-Lab, and the ATLAS Institute. His practice is defined by long-form, conceptually rigorous project cycles that interrogate the agency of non-human systems and the aesthetics of post-digital media.
Notable works include:
- Talking Doors (2010, with Julijonas Urbonas): Awarded a Distinction at Prix Ars Electronica, this early collaboration explored interactive sonic environments.
- Orbital Eccentricity (2018–2019): A real-time satellite sonification system developed during residencies at ZKM | Hertz-Lab, investigating planetary media and orbital data as performative material.
- ZOE: Actant (2017–2022): A multimedia installation probing biological agency and post-human embodiment, created during a residency at Hospital do Divino Espírito Santo in the Azores.
- Negentropy: The Last Man in the Wasteland (2024): A multimedia opera integrating AI-driven dramaturgy and real-time CO₂ data sonification, supported by DGArtes.
- Corpus Pygmalion, ODO (2020), and Yugen (2024): Collaborative works with choreographer Chris Ziegler that explore embodied performance, AI, and human-machine interaction through expanded scenography and algorithmic movement.
Paquete’s research has been consistently supported by competitive grants and mobility programs from national and European institutions, including the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), DGArtes, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, and i-Portunus.
Integrated Research Philosophy
Hugo Paquete’s artistic research constitutes a form of critical system-building, an epistemic practice that composes operational ecosystems rather than isolated sonic artifacts. Rooted in media archaeology, post-digital aesthetics, and vibrational ontology, his work privileges resonance over harmony: the entangled vibrational interplay between matter, code, and meaning. Through strategies of glitch, entropy, and engineered failure, Paquete reveals the latent politics and materiality embedded within technological infrastructures. His works function as autopoietic environments—self-generating systems where aesthetic experience is inseparable from philosophical inquiry. These environments interrogate the techno-social unconscious, reconfiguring sound as a medium of resistance, speculation, and infrastructural critique. Paquete’s position within the lineage of sound artists such as Ryoji Ikeda and Christina Kubisch is marked by a distinctive integration of sonic materialism with systemic analysis, producing a methodology that is both conceptually rigorous and materially grounded.
Pedagogical Philosophy Resume
My pedagogical philosophy transforms education into a form of critical and speculative practice. Grounded in my artistic research, I frame the classroom as a live ecosystem where students develop emancipated technological fluency—a deep integration of technical skill, critical theory, and ethical awareness. This approach moves beyond the transmission of knowledge to empower students as forensic analysts and creative intervenors in the technological systems that shape contemporary life.
Core Methodologies:
The practice is driven by six principal research probes:
- Forensic Sonic Ecologies: Using forensic listening to audit the hidden politics of technology.
- Glitch as Epistemic Tool: Harnessing error and system failure for critical revelation.
- Critical Sonification: Rendering data audible to expose forces of control and care.
- Multi-Scalar Sonic Ontologies: Investigating sound from micro-perceptual to immersive scales.
- Post-Human Collaboration: Distributing agency across human and non-human actors.
- Field Recording as Infrastructural Resistance: Making hidden systems audible as a political act.
Outcome:
The goal is to cultivate critical hybrid practitioners, not merely artists or designers, but engaged agents capable of listening critically, intervening creatively, and ethically reconfiguring the techno-social landscapes of our time. This pedagogy positions education itself as a vital act of sonic and systemic imagination.
This section organizes key publications and artistic research that form the conceptual backbone of my practice. Rather than a linear chronology, the work is grouped into four intersecting clusters that define my ongoing investigation into sound, technology, and power.
These frameworks—The Technological Unconscious, Post-Techno Aesthetics, Biopolitical Sonification, and Critical Pedagogical Probes—function as both analytical tools and creative engines. They map a trajectory from infrastructural critique to the development of new sonic epistemologies and a pedagogy aimed at emancipated technological fluency.
Explore the clusters below to trace the development of these core ideas.
- Cluster 1: The Technological Unconscious & Infrastructural Critique
- Paquete, Hugo. (2025) Sabotaje Sonoro: La IA como Instrumento de Desobediencia en la Performance Post-Operática / Sonic Sabotage: AI as Disobedient Instrument in Post-Operatic Performance. iA*lab Sensoria, Universidade da Beira Interior, and Absonus Lab: Sound Research, Technology and Culture.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2025. "Post-Apocalyptic Negentropy: The Intersection of Technology, Environment, and Generative Music in Opera." Paper presented at Avanca, Cinema 2025: International Conference Cinema: Art, Technology, Communication, Avanca, Portugal.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2024. “Repensando a Ópera: Desafios e Oportunidades em Negentropy: The Last Man in the Wasteland.” Presented at Conferência Internacional de Processos de Criação, Complexo Pedagógico do Campus da Penha, ISEC – Instituto de Engenharia Civil, Faro, Portugal.
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Paquete, Hugo, Paulo Bernardino Bastos, and Adérito Fernandes-Marcos. 2022. “Orbital Eccentricity: Sound Performance Utilizing Commercial and Military Satellites with Real-Time Tracking Data.” In Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Digital and Interactive Arts (ARTECH '21), Article 101, 1–4. New York, NY: Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/3483529.3483748.
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Paquete, Hugo, Paulo Bernardino Bastos, and Adérito Marcos. 2019. “Ao som dos fluxos da informação: processos de sonificação nas artes sonoras.” In Livro de Atas de AVANCA | CINEMA 2019, Conferência Internacional de Cinema – Arte, Tecnologia, Comunicação, edited by A.C. Valente, Chapter I – Cinema | Arte, 1–10. Avanca, Portugal: AVANCA | CINEMA. ISSN: 2184-0520. http://hdl.handle.net/10400.2/9270
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Paquete, Hugo, Paulo Bernardino Bastos, and Adérito Fernandes-Marcos. 2020. “Velocidade Terminal: Tempo Cronoscópico dos Corpos Orbitais na Composição Sonora e Musical.” In Livro de Atas de AVANCA | CINEMA 2020 – Conferência Internacional de Cinema: Arte, Tecnologia, Comunicação, edited by A.C. Valente, Chapter I – Cinema, Arte, 274–283. Avanca, Portugal: AVANCA | CINEMA. ISSN 2184-0520.
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Paquete, Hugo, Adérito Fernandes-Marcos, and Paulo Bernardino Bastos. 2020. “Radiação Obscura: Fluxos Energéticos Sonificados no Limiar da Experiência Sonora.” In Avanca International Conference of Cinema – Art, Technology, Communication, 24–29 July 2020. Cine Clube Avanca, Portugal.
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Paquete, Hugo, and Graham Harman. 2021. “Relations between the Post-Digital and the Industrial Complex of Capitalism: Reformulations on Technology as Ideology and Digital Garbage in Art.” In AVANCA | CINEMA No. 12: Conferência Internacional AVANCA | CINEMA 2021, 233–242. Avanca: Edições Cine-Clube de Avanca.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2016. “Tecnocultura Sónica: Etno-Tecnologia, Música e Política.” In Dispositivos na Prática Artística Contemporânea #3, edited by Eduarda Neves, 13–31. Porto: Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo da CESAP/ESAP. ISBN 978-972-8784-74-4.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2016. “Tecno-Utopia Cyberpunk no Projecto Peenemünde.” Presented at Log In, Live On: Music and Cyberculture in the Age of the Internet of Things Conference, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 7–8 October 2016.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2016. “Reprodutibilidade e Hibridismo na Tecnocultura.” Presented at Colóquio Internacional A Carta de Courbet, Escola Superior Artística do Porto, 17 November 2016.
- Paquete, Hugo. 2016. “Projecto Peenemünde: Cyberpunk, Utopia e o Pós-Digital.” Presented at Mensageiros das Estrelas: Colóquio Ficção Científica & Fantasia, Universidade de Letras de Lisboa, 16–18 November 2016.
- Cluster 2: Post-Techno Aesthetics & Sonic Epistemology
- Paquete, Hugo. 2025. Sabotaje Sonoro: La IA como Instrumento de Desobediencia en la Performance Post-Operática / Sonic Sabotage: AI as Disobedient Instrument in Post-Operatic Performance. Self-published online by Absonus Lab: Sonic Research, Technology and Culture.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2025. From Data to Disobedience: Post-Operatic Sonification, Vocal Ontologies, and Negentropic Aesthetics of Noise.
Self-published online by Absonus Lab: Sonic Research, Technology and Culture.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2025. “Aesthetic Homogenization in Electronic Music: The Impact of AI and Capitalism in Computer Music.” CIAC – Research Center for Arts and Communication and Absonus Lab: Sonic Research, Technology and Culture. Algarve University and Absonus Lab Association, Portugal. Self-published online by Absonus Lab: Sonic Research, Technology and Culture.
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Paquete, Hugo, Christine Bonansea Saulut, and Chris Ziegler. 2024. “YUGEN Artist Talk – Tanzhaus NRW.” Artist talk held on 13 January 2024 at Tanzhaus NRW, Düsseldorf, as part of the MODINA project. Direction and choreography: Christine Bonansea Saulut; media and stage: Chris Ziegler; music and sound: Hugo Paquete; 3D programming: Ben Fischer (MIREVI Team / HSD, Düsseldorf); videography: Leon Lösch. Accessed 29 June 2025. https://modina.eu/projects/yugen
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Paquete, Hugo. 2023. “OOO: Sound Art and Technology as Speculative Realism.” In AVANCA | CINEMA 2023, no. 14, Chapter III – Cinema: Communication. CIAC: Centro de Investigação em Artes e Comunicação and CEMCPD: Centro de Estudos em Música e Cultura Pós-Digital. Universidade Aberta, Universidade do Algarve, and Associação Absonus Lab, Portugal. Published October 30, 2023. https://publication.avanca.org/index.php/avancacinema/article/view/526
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Paquete, Hugo Filipe Rodrigues. 2022. Imanências espectrais: reflexão sobre o pós-digital nas artes sonoras. PhD diss., Universidade Aberta and Universidade do Algarve. 524 pp. [Online]. http://hdl.handle.net/10400.2/9268
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Paquete, Hugo. 2020. “Sonificação do Limiar: Eletromagnetismo como Possibilidade na Criação Sonora Musical.” In Investigação–Experimentação–Criação: em Arte–Ciência–Tecnologia, edited by D. Marques and A. Gago. Coleção Cibertextualidades. Porto: Publicações Universidade Fernando Pessoa. ISBN 978-989-643-163-1, ISSN 1646-4435.
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Paquete, Hugo, Adérito Fernandes-Marcos, and Paulo Bernardino Bastos. 2019. “Ao Som dos Fluxos da Informação: Processos de Sonificação nas Artes Sonoras.” In Avanca International Conference of Cinema – Art, Technology, Communication, 24–29 July 2019. Cine Clube Avanca, Portugal.
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Paquete, Hugo, Adérito Fernandes-Marcos, and Paulo Bernardino Bastos. 2019. “Dromologia dos Corpos Orbitais: Projeto de Desenvolvimento de Hardware e Estratégias de Composição Sonora.” Presented at Encontro Internacional #18.ART: Da Admirável Ordem das Coisas – Arte, Emoção e Tecnologia, Faculdade de Belas-Artes, Lisbon, Portugal.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2018. “Tecno-Utopia Cyberpunk no Projeto Peenemünde.” In Log In, Live On: Música e Cibercultura na Era da Internet das Coisas, Chapter 04, 279–360. Lisboa: Húmus/CESEM.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2017–2018. “Interview with Roy Ascott.” In Technoculture: An Online Journal of Technology in Society, vol. 7. ISSN 1938-0526. https://tcjournal.org/vol7/ascott-interview.
- Paquete, Hugo. 2015. “Pareidolia: Glitch-Evento, Metodologia e Espectro.” In Interact: Revista Online de Arte, Cultura e Tecnologia, edited by Centro de Estudos de Comunicação e Linguagens, FCSH / NOVA – Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas, Universidade Nova de Lisboa. https://interact.com.pt/22/pareidolia/. . ISSN 2182-1402.
- Cluster 3: Biopolitics & Sonification
- Paquete, Hugo. 2025. Entropic Soundscapes: Integrating Environmental Data and Interactive Technologies in Generative Operatic Performance. Self-published online by Absonus Lab: Sonic Research, Technology and Culture, in collaboration with CIAC: Research Centre for Arts and Communication, Algarve University. https://absonuslab.org
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Paquete, Hugo. 2022. “Zoonosis Leptospirosis: Spiral Rhythms as Sound and Musical Infection.” In #18.ART: Da Admirável Ordem das Coisas – Arte, Emoção e Tecnologia, presented at the conference held at Faculdade de Belas-Artes, Lisbon, October 17–19, 2019. http://hdl.handle.net/10400.2/9269.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2020. “The Sound of Non-Human Agents from a Musicological Perspective.” In Ensaiar Arte e Ciência para Religar Natureza e Cultura, presented originally in 2017 and published 2019–2020. The essay explores post-humanist perspectives in sound creation, focusing on biological and non-human entities in digital art and music.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2019. “The Sound of Non-Human Agents from a Musicological Perspective.” In Ensaiar Arte e Ciência para Religar Natureza e Cultura, edited by Alison Neilson and José Eduardo Silva, 151–162. Porto: Teatro do Frio.
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Paquete, Hugo, Adérito Fernandes-Marcos, and Paulo Bernardino Bastos. 2019. “Zoonose: Leptospirose e os Ritmos Espirais como Infeção Sonora e Musical.” Presented at Encontro Internacional #18.ART: Da Admirável Ordem das Coisas – Arte, Emoção e Tecnologia, Faculdade de Belas-Artes, Lisbon, Portugal.
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Paquete, Hugo, and Ana Santos. 2019. “O Corpo Terminal do Terceiro Milénio: Rede de Conexões e a Obsolescência Estética.” Presented at Encontro Internacional #18.ART: Da Admirável Ordem das Coisas – Arte, Emoção e Tecnologia, Faculdade de Belas-Artes, Lisbon, Portugal.
- Paquete, Hugo. 2019. “Obscure Radiation: Events of Decay and Extrude.” In Portuguese Emerging Art 2019. EMERGE – Associação Cultural. Published for the launch at Museu de Serralves, Portugal, 9 November 2019.
- Cluster 4: Pedagogical Probes: Critical Technological Fluency
- Paquete, Hugo. 2025. Critical Practices in Computer Music: A Post-Techno Methodology for Sustainable and Inclusive Education. Self-published online by Absonus Lab: Sonic Research, Technology and Culture.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2024. Negentropy Nexus: Residência e Conferências. A year-long cycle of online sessions and public events organized by Absonus Lab. Activities included collaborative dialogues on contemporary music (19 October, with Cláudio de Pina, Daria Baiocchi, and R. Gritto), performance studies (26 October, with Ana Santos and Simona Dichio), queer theory and expanded performance (16 November, with Jack "Mia" Shamblin and Dan Antoniu), and a masterclass on software art and animation (4 December, with Pedro Alves da Veiga).
- Paquete, Hugo, and Sérgio Eliseu. 2019. “Snow Cristal: Projeto de Arte e Tecnologia.” In Avanca International Conference of Cinema – Art, Technology, Communication, 24–29 July 2019. Cine Clube Avanca, Portugal.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2017. “Entrevista na RTP Açores 24.” With Ana Nobre. Açores 24, Episode 106, 14 June 2017. Conducted during an artistic residency in partnership with Hospital do Divino Espírito Santo and Arquipélago – Centro de Arte Contemporânea, supported by Governo dos Açores.
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Paquete, Hugo. 2016. “Conversa com os Compositores Selecionados no Âmbito do Projeto Música em Criação.” Presented at Aveiro Síntese: 2º Festival Internacional de Música Eletroacústica, Museu Arte Nova, Aveiro, 7 March 2016.
- Paquete, Hugo. 2016. “A Internacionalização dos Artistas.” Presented at Artistic Creation and Mass Media in Europe – Creart International Conference, Edifício da Antiga Capitania do Porto de Aveiro, 25 November 2016.
- Paquete, Hugo Filipe Rodrigues. 2014. Entropia Disfuncional: Noise, Glitch e Caos nas Artes Sonoras. https://ria.ua.pt/handle/10773/13696?locale=pt_PT.
Conclusion
Together, these conceptual clusters form an evolving ecosystem of thought, a living archive where artistic practice, theoretical inquiry, and pedagogical innovation converge. From infrastructural critique to post-human collaboration, this body of work demonstrates how sound operates not merely as an artistic medium but as a critical tool for auditing, interrogating, and reimagining the technological systems that shape contemporary experience. These frameworks remain open, inviting further dialogue, experimentation, and collaborative exploration at the intersections of art, technology, and critical theory.
My teaching transforms the classroom into a speculative ecosystem, a live environment for critical inquiry and creative intervention. Grounded in my artistic research, this philosophy moves beyond skill transmission to foster emancipated technological fluency, where students learn to forensically analyze, sonically map, and ethically reconfigure the systems that shape our world.
This section outlines the core principles, methods, and outcomes of a pedagogy designed to cultivate critical hybrid practitioners: artists and thinkers equipped to navigate and transform the complexities of a post-digital culture.
Pedagogic Philosophy
My pedagogical philosophy emerges directly from my artistic research, framing education as a critical and speculative practice that integrates theory, experimentation, and creative inquiry. Rather than conceiving the classroom as a site of information transfer, I approach it as a speculative ecosystem, a live, operational environment where students learn to forensically analyze, sonically map, and creatively intervene in the technological, cultural, and ecological systems that shape contemporary life.
At the core of this approach is what I define as emancipated technological fluency: a deep integration of technical skills, critical theory, and aesthetic sensibility. Students are encouraged to engage not only with tools but with the infrastructures, histories, and politics embedded within them, cultivating the capacity to act as critical agents within the post-digital condition.
Research Drive Principals
- Forensic Sonic Ecologies
The classroom operates as a site of media-archaeological excavation and infrastructural critique. Through hands-on engagement with electromagnetic fields, obsolete hardware, and algorithmic processes, students practice forensic listening, auditing the hidden materialities and politics of technological systems.
- Glitch and System Failure as Epistemic Tools
Building on my artistic methodologies, I employ glitch, error, and entropy as critical drivers of inquiry. Techniques such as circuit bending, databending, and infrastructural hacking are framed as strategies of resistance—methods to reveal the fragility, opacity, and politics of digital systems.
- Critical Sonification
My research on biopolitical sonification informs the curriculum, where biomedical signals, environmental sensors, and planetary data are transduced into sound. Students learn to render audible the abstract forces of quantification, control, and care that structure contemporary societies.
- Multi-Scalar Ontologies of Sound
From microsound to immersive acoustic architectures, students investigate sound as a vibrational phenomenon across scales. This fosters an understanding of how sound reorganizes perception, both at sub-perceptual levels and within collective, spatialized experiences.
- Distributed Agency and Post-Human Collaboration
Teaching projects are designed as multi-agent systems that integrate human participants, generative algorithms, AI, and responsive environments. This post-human pedagogy challenges anthropocentric creativity and prepares students for collaborative practices within complex techno-ecological systems.
- Field Recording as Infrastructural Resistance
Recording practices are reframed as a means of exposing hidden infrastructures of communication, capital, and control. By capturing biophonic, electromagnetic, and telecommunication signals, students engage in a politics of resistance that begins with making the inaudible audible.
Outcomes
This pedagogical architecture does not transmit fixed knowledge but composes resonant learning conditions. Students emerge as critical hybrid practitioners who move beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries—capable of integrating artistic research, sonic practice, and critical theory to analyze, disrupt, and reimagine the infrastructures of contemporary life.
Ultimately, the aim is to prepare creators who can listen critically, intervene creatively, and act ethically within a technologically saturated world. Graduates of this approach are not only artists or designers but also engaged researchers and cultural agents, able to transform the very systems through which perception, communication, and power are organized.
Pedagogic Capacity
With a PhD in Digital Media Art and in my role as Adjunct Professor at the University of Algarve, I have developed a pedagogical practice that bridges more than twelve years of experience in higher education, technical-professional training, and artistic contexts. My approach is critical, interdisciplinary, and speculative, framing education not as the transmission of fixed knowledge but as the composition of collaborative ecosystems of inquiry, where learning emerges through experimentation, reflexive practice, and critical engagement with technology.
My methodology integrates studio-based learning, project-based learning, and artistic research as pedagogy, cultivating what I define as emancipated technological fluency: the ability of students to navigate, interrogate, and creatively intervene in the infrastructures of contemporary digital culture. Within this framework, students act not only as makers but also as forensic analysts of the technological unconscious, developing agency across aesthetic, theoretical, and technical domains.
Epistemological Foundation
Rooted in a multidisciplinary formation spanning visual arts, new media, musicology, and digital media art—with specializations in sound arts, computational music, spatialization, performance, installation, and video—I articulate an expanded artistic practice where sound, image, object, body, and space operate as interdependent systems.
Sound, in particular, is treated as an autonomous and spatial material—capable of structuring narrative, tension, atmosphere, and architecture—rather than as a secondary or illustrative element. This conception opens space for a post-digital pedagogy, where glitch, system failure, and entropy become epistemic strategies, and where interactive systems, performance, and embodied media act as co-creators of knowledge. Education is here understood as a form of infrastructural critique and speculative system-building, grounded in ecological, cultural, and meta-political awareness.
Teaching Areas and Methods
I teach across sound arts, contemporary music, computational arts, multimedia, and performance, with methodological emphases on:
- Artistic creation as research, integrating experimentation and critical reflection.
- Emerging technologies, including AI, sonification, and generative systems.
- Sound synthesis, multichannel spatialization, and immersive design.
- Circuit bending, hardware hacking, and experimental electronics.
- Intermedia practices at the intersection of sound, image, body, and space.
Supervision and Leadership
I have supervised and coordinated projects at BA and MA level, mentored artistic residencies, and supported interdisciplinary collaborations that merge research, artistic production, and pedagogy. My teaching practice ultimately seeks to form hybrid practitioners—artists, thinkers, and researchers—capable of critically listening to, analyzing, and reconfiguring the complex techno-social environments of our time.
Conclusion
Ultimately, this philosophy transcends conventional teaching to form a practice of critical intervention. It is dedicated to cultivating a new type of creator: the critical hybrid practitioner, who is equipped not just to navigate but to ethically reconfigure the techno-social landscapes of our time. Through this approach, education becomes a vital act of sonic and systemic imagination.
This section details the practical application of my pedagogical philosophy, outlining my experience, methodological approaches, and specific teaching expertise. It bridges over twelve years of practice across higher education, technical training, and artistic contexts, demonstrating how the conceptual framework of emancipated technological fluency is implemented in diverse learning environments.
Below, you will find my epistemological foundation, key teaching areas, and a record of academic leadership, illustrating a commitment to forming critical hybrid practitioners capable of navigating and reshaping our techno-social reality.
Pedagogic Capacity
I have developed a pedagogical practice that bridges more than twelve years of experience in higher education, technical-professional training, and artistic contexts. My approach is critical, interdisciplinary, and speculative, framing education not as the transmission of fixed knowledge but as the composition of collaborative ecosystems of inquiry, where learning emerges through experimentation, reflexive practice, and critical engagement with technology.
My methodology integrates studio-based learning, project-based learning, and artistic research as pedagogy, cultivating what I define as emancipated technological fluency: the ability of students to navigate, interrogate, and creatively intervene in the infrastructures of contemporary digital culture. Within this framework, students act not only as makers but also as forensic analysts of the technological unconscious, developing agency across aesthetic, theoretical, and technical domains.
Epistemological Foundation
Rooted in a multidisciplinary formation spanning visual arts, new media, musicology, and digital media art—with specializations in sound arts, computational music, spatialization, performance, installation, and video—I articulate an expanded artistic practice where sound, image, object, body, and space operate as interdependent systems.
Sound, in particular, is treated as an autonomous and spatial material—capable of structuring narrative, tension, atmosphere, and architecture—rather than as a secondary or illustrative element. This conception opens space for a post-digital pedagogy, where glitch, system failure, and entropy become epistemic strategies, and where interactive systems, performance, and embodied media act as co-creators of knowledge. Education is here understood as a form of infrastructural critique and speculative system-building, grounded in ecological, cultural, and meta-political awareness.
Teaching Areas and Methods
I teach across sound arts, contemporary music, computational arts, multimedia, and performance, with methodological emphases on:
- Artistic creation as research: integrating experimentation, critical reflection, and practice-based inquiry in media art, sound art, and electronic/computer music.
- Emerging technologies: applying AI, machine learning, sonification, generative algorithms, and adaptive systems to explore new paradigms of artistic production.
- Sound synthesis and spatialization: advanced techniques in additive, subtractive, granular, FM, spectral, and wavetable synthesis; design for multichannel, ambisonic, and immersive acoustic architectures.
- Glitch and system failure as epistemic tools: exploring circuit bending, hardware hacking, reverse engineering, and system sabotage as creative-critical strategies.
- Intermedia practices: bridging sound, image, body, and space within contexts such as interactive installation, audiovisual performance, and immersive environments.
- Post-human performance and distributed agency: developing pedagogical frameworks where creativity emerges through collaboration between humans, AI, responsive systems, and ecological/technological infrastructures.
- Critical field recording and infrastructural listening: engaging with electromagnetic, environmental, and telecommunication ecologies to expose the hidden infrastructures of communication, capital, and control.
- Transmedia experimentation: creating works that operate across multiple media systems, emphasizing speculative aesthetics and expanded forms of narrative and experience.
- Meta-political and ecological awareness: positioning sound and media practices as tools to interrogate the cultural, ethical, and ecological dimensions of contemporary technological systems.
I have supervised and coordinated projects at BA and MA level, mentored artistic residencies, and supported interdisciplinary collaborations that merge research, artistic production, and pedagogy. My teaching practice ultimately seeks to form hybrid practitioners—artists, thinkers, and researchers—capable of critically listening to, analyzing, and reconfiguring the complex techno-social environments of our time.
Potencial Theoretical and Partical Classes (Seminars and Lectures)
These classes focus on critical context, history, and theory.
- Critical Histories of Sound Art and Experimental Music: Traces the evolution of the field from early avant-garde to post-digital practices, focusing on key works, concepts, and technological shifts.
- Media Archaeology: Excavating the Technological Unconscious: Explores the hidden histories of media technology, focusing on obsolescence, dead ends, and the materiality of tools.
- Post-Digital Aesthetics: Glitch, Noise, and Metapolitical Resistance: A deep dive into the theories behind using system failure, error, and noise as subcultural critical artistic strategies against technological transparency and capitalist cycles ussed by counterculture movements, from cyberpunk to technoculture.
- Philosophies of Sound: Vibrational Ontology and Sonic Agency: Examines sound as a fundamental force, exploring theories that treat it as an agent that shapes perception, space, and being (e.g., from phenomenology sound event to object-oriented ontology).
- Biopolitical Sonification: Auditing Control and Care: Theorizes the practice of sonification as a critical method for making audible the systems of quantification, surveillance, and biopower that govern contemporary life.
- Posthumanism and Art: Distributed Agency in Hybrid Systems: Investigates theories that decentre the human artist, exploring collaboration with non-human actants (algorithms, animals, environments, objects).
Pratical & Studio Based Classes (Labs and Workshops)
These classes focus on hands-on technical and artistic skills.
- Creative Noise and Sonic Dialectics: A practical introduction to using digital audio workstations (Ableton Live, Bitwig) as laboratories for generative composition and sonic experimentation. Students will explore noise-based synthesis, aleatoric processes, and modular routing to develop unique compositional strategies and custom sonic palettes.
- Expanded Field Recording and Sonic Archaeology: This workshop redefines field recording as a form of critical inquiry. Students will build and use electromagnetic inductors, contact microphones to capture sonic phenomena across diverse contexts. The course focuses on composing with these materials for installation and performance, treating recording as an act of media-archaeological excavation.
- Advanced Sound Spatialization for Immersive Media: A technical lab dedicated to multichannel sound design for immersive environments. Using tools like SpatGRIS and Reaper, students will master techniques in Ambisonics and object-based audio for application in installation, live performance, virtual reality, and film.
- Post-Techno Lab: Circuit Bending and Critical Hardware Hacking: A hands-on workshop in the creative modification and repurposing of obsolete electronic devices. Students will learn to intentionally harness system failure, exploring circuit bending as an epistemic strategy for critiquing technological obsolescence and fostering a critical, DIY approach to electronics.
- Sound Design and Acousmatic Composition: This project-based course delves into the creation of sonic worlds for fixed and interactive media. Students will master the practical craft of sound design, including Foley, ambiences, and sound effects, while simultaneously exploring acousmatic composition techniques for developing musical structures purely through sound. Using DAWs like Reaper and Bitwig, the course emphasizes how sonic material can shape narrative, define space, and generate dramatic tension in animation, film, and installation.
- Creative AI as a Collaborative Partner in Sound: This class investigates artificial intelligence as a co-creator in the artistic process. Through project-based work with tools like Magenta Studio, Orb Composer, Atlas, XO, and custom GPT prompts, students will explore AI-driven sound generation, pattern recognition, and interactive composition.
- Interactive Systems for Live Performance: A studio class focused on building integrated systems for multimedia performance. Students will learn to synchronize sound, light, video, and movement using OSC and MIDI protocols, creating responsive environments and instruments for real-time, technologically mediated performances.
Hybrid Theory/Practice “Research-Creation” Courses
These advanced seminars function as integrated ateliers where critical theory directly fuels artistic production. Students engage in semester-long research-creation projects, culminating in public exhibitions, performances, or publications that demonstrate a mastery of both conceptual and technical domains.
- 1. Research-Creation Lab I: Sonic Forensics and Infrastructural Critique
- Theoretical Frame: Media Archaeology, Infrastructural Critique, Biopolitical Sonification, Vibrational Ontology.
- Practical Skills: Expanded Field Recording, Critical Sonification, Multichannel Spatialization, Sound Design.
- Course Description: This lab positions students as forensic analysts of the technological unconscious. Each student selects a specific infrastructure (e.g., a local data center's energy consumption, the electromagnetic spectrum of a WiFi network, the orbital path of a satellite) as their research subject. Through a combination of theoretical reading and hands-on investigation, using techniques like electromagnetic induction, data scraping, and sensor logging, students will gather "evidence." The core creative challenge is to translate this research into a sound-based artwork (e.g., an acousmatic composition, an interactive installation, a performance) that sonically critiques and reveals the hidden political, social, and material layers of their chosen system.
- 2. Research-Creation Lab II: The Post-Human Sonic Event
- Theoretical Frame: Posthumanism, Object-Oriented Ontology, Theories of the Sonic Event, Post-Digital Aesthetics.
- Practical Skills: Creative AI, Interactive Systems, Generative Composition, Advanced Spatialization.
- Course Description: This course explores the "sonic event" as a convergence point of human and non-human agencies. Students will develop a major project that stages a sonic event where agency is distributed among algorithms, environmental data, and human performers. How can an AI's pattern recognition influence a live improvisation? How can weather data or biometric feedback become a co-composer? Projects will utilize tools for creative AI, network protocols (OSC), and multichannel sound to create performances or installations that challenge anthropocentric creativity and explore sound as an emergent phenomenon within complex, hybrid systems.
- 3. Research-Creation Lab III: Post-Digital Ecologies and Metapolitical Resistance
- Theoretical Frame: Post-Digital Aesthetics, Glitch Studies, Media Archaeology, Ecomusicology.
- Practical Skills: Circuit Bending, Hardware Hacking, Creative Noise, Composition with Obsolete Media.
- Course Description: This capstone-style lab addresses the material and cultural ecologies of a post-digital world. Students will create a final project that engages directly with themes of technological obsolescence, electronic waste, and metapolitical resistance. The course frames artistic strategies like circuit bending, databending, and the creative reuse of "dead" media as gestures of ecological and cultural critique. The final outcome, an installation, artefact, performance, or instrument, will serve as a speculative artifact that embodies a critical stance against the cycles of planned obsolescence and explores a sustainable, critical future for media art.
- 3. Research-Creation Seminar: Composing with/against the Algorithm
- Theoretical Frame: Biopolitical Sonification, Critical AI Studies, Post-Digital Aesthetics.
- Practical Skills: Sound Design, Acousmatic Composition, Creative AI, Custom Software (e.g., GPT prompts, Magenta).
- Course Description: This seminar investigates the complex relationship between the composer, sound designer, and the algorithmic systems that increasingly mediate creation. Students will critically examine AI tools not as neutral assistants but as ideological entities with inherent biases. The core project involves creating a composition or sound design work that explicitly engages with an AI tool, either through collaboration, subversion, or sabotage. The goal is to produce a piece that demonstrates a sophisticated understanding of how algorithms shape aesthetic outcomes and to develop a personal, critical methodology for working with (or against) them.
Conclusion
Together, this curriculum constructs a comprehensive ecosystem for advanced education in sound and media art. It is designed as an ascending spiral of knowledge: the Theoretical and Practical Classes provide the foundational critical vocabularies and technical skills; the Hybrid Research-Creation Courses serve as the crucial nexus where these elements converge, demanding their synthesis into sophisticated artistic research.
This structure embodies my core pedagogical principle: that rigorous theoretical inquiry and hands-on technical experimentation are inseparable. The ultimate aim is to cultivate a new generation of critical hybrid practitioners, artists and thinkers who do not merely use tools, but who forensically analyze their conditions, ethically engage with non-human agencies, and creatively intervene in the techno-social infrastructures of our time.
This vision, however, thrives on dialogue and exchange. The questions explored here, from infrastructural critique and post-human performance to critical sonification, are inherently collaborative. I am always interested in connecting with fellow artists, researchers, and institutions who share a passion for rethinking the role of sound, technology, and art in contemporary society.
This pedagogical vision is designed to be adaptable and can be integrated into existing programs or form the basis of new ones. If these ideas resonate with your institution's goals and you see potential for collaboration, whether through guest teaching, developing a workshop series, designing a full curriculum, a research project, an artistic residency, or a shared publication, I warmly invite you to get in touch.
Hugo Paquete - Sonic Media Artist Creating Post-Digital Sound Art and Immersive Installations
Hugo Paquete is a research-based media artist, composer, and academic whose transdisciplinary practice investigates the technological unconscious through post-digital sonic media art. His work operates at the intersection of critical sound studies, media archaeology, and post-digital aesthetics, creating immersive installations and performances that transform sound into philosophical inquiry.
Key projects include NEGENTROPY electronic opera, SARS-COV-2 sound installation, YUGEN dance performance, and Obscure Radiation electromagnetic sonification. Hugo Paquete's artistic research explores biopolitical sonification, vibrational ecologies, and the politics of listening through experimental composition and acousmatic practices.