At the heart of A Comparative Dialogue Act is a residency programme, initiated by Andrea Mancini and Every Island. During the exhibition at Mudam, four guest artists are invited to engage with the installation, infusing it with their individual and collective signature. They will work on site during the production phase and will present their newly created pieces during the performances.

The residency unfolds further with its second guest bela, who takes on voice and composition to reveal non-binary-gender experiences and to re*build relationships between value systems and memories. They explore the liberatory potential of contemporary sound and movement, by performing rituals full of tactile and guttural sounds that reflect on the precarity of life, queer identity and survival modes in South Korea.

Biography

Originally from South Korea, bela (they/them) is a musician, performance artist and DJ based in Berlin and Prague. In addition to their work as a musician and performance artist, bela also collaborates on audio visual performances with Theresa Baumgartner and Lukas Feigelfeld and performs improvised vocals with AKA HEX (Aïsha Devi and Slikback). Their solo and collaborative live performances have been featured at Berlin Atonal; Trauma Bar und Kino, Berlin; Nowadays, NYC; Schauspielhaus Zürich; Lunchmeat, Prague; Cafe OTO, London; CTM Festival, Berlin; Ephemera, Warsaw; and Unsound Kraków. As a DJ, bela debuted in Seoul's underground scene in 2017 at Cakeshop and have since played at clubs like Tresor, Berlin; Säule, Berlin; ALL, Shanghai; and Ankali's Planeta Za, Prague. bela co-runs Sorrow Club, an event series combining music and non-music formats. They were nominated for the SHAPE+ Platform 2023-24.