PRS Foundation awards funding to Brighton Dome’s earsthetic season

Brighton Dome’s annual season of boundary-breaking audio-visual work earsthetic (27 Nov – 1 Dec) has been awarded £3,000 by the prestigious PRS for Music Foundation, the UK’s leading charitable funder of new music and talent development across all genres.

The grant was awarded through PRS for Music Foundation’s popular and competitive Open Funding programme.

The brainchild of Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival’s music producer Laura Ducceschi, earsthetic aims to provide a platform for art which straddles the sonic and the visual, presenting work in which – unlike traditional avenues for contemporary music - both elements are given equal weight. Now in its third year the mini-season has previously welcomed the likes of Peaches, Kele and Chicks on Speed.

Stepping aside from the typical music industry model earsthetic also aims to support the creation process, working with artists directly through The Works – which offers opportunities to develop artists’ ideas and concepts, understand their practice, take risks and give full attention to the detail of their presentation.

Laura Ducceschi says: “We are delighted to have been awarded funding from PRS for Music Foundation for earsthetic. earsthetic was born out of a lack of opportunities to experience projects that sit between the visual and sonic. One without the other means the artwork is incomplete and only half-received by the audience. The name 'earsthetic' represents just this.

Art never moves forward if artists don’t move into new territory… and it is the responsibility of arts organisations to support that. But resources are not often not available to enable the creation of work in this way, and it isn’t supported by commercial models of music making. The grant from PRS for Music Foundation not only provides valuable funds to enable us to continue this work but also offers a fantastic endorsement of the project. This year, earsthetic is representing a whole host of artists who are stepping into new territory. Think about the exciting scene in Brooklyn, Berlin, Paris… we want to add Brighton to that list.”

This year earsthetic returns in its new November slot with an array of visual and sonic artists committed to pushing the boundaries of their chosen discipline. The line-up includes a new musical-performance project from CocoRosie’s Bianca Casady, a visually stunning show from cult performers The Tiger Lillies, a multisensory double bill from duo Sculpture and Alex Smoke with visual artist Florence To, immersive audio-visual installation SeaWomen by acclaimed artist Mikhail Karikis and contemporary musical theatre from vocalist and former earsthetic The Works artist Elaine Mitchener.