Wukir Suryadi, Chris Pitsiokos – Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art

We invite you to a special evening at the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art as part of the 10th edition of Avant Art Festival Warsaw.

Wukir Suryadi 

• An Indonesian experimental musician, composer and instrument builder, born in Malang in 1977 and currently based in Salatiga, Central Java. Also known as a co-founder of the duo Senyawa, he develops an interdisciplinary practice at the intersection of craft, sound installation and radical performance. His work has been presented at venues including the Weltkulturen Museum, STEIM – Studio for Electro-Instrumental Music, Kyoto Art Center and the National Gallery of Victoria, as well as at the Asian Art Biennial, Jakarta Biennale and Biennale Jogja. At the centre of his practice are original instruments constructed from natural materials, everyday objects, and elements of machines and tools. Structures such as Bambu Wukir, Garu, Industrial Mutant and the Sustainable Sonic Engine allow him to create a wide spectrum of sounds — from meditative, subtle structures to intense, post-industrial distortions. For Suryadi, working with materials also becomes a way of addressing environmental issues and the relationship between humans, technology and their surroundings.
• • At Avant Art Festival, the artist will present the solo performance TITIR ON THE PODIUM: A Dialogue between Złoty and Opłatek, performed on the Sustainable Sonic Engine — an experimental instrument whose main body is made of bamboo. In the piece, Suryadi enters into a wordless dialogue with the material and cultural symbols of Poland, contrasting the weight and coldness of the złoty with the fragility and spiritual significance of the opłatek.
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• The performance moves from intimate, meditative tensions towards an intense, mechanical sound of a post-industrial character. Its successive stages — Nginguk, Sopo Ingsun, Industrial Mutant and Siklus dan Doa — create a space for reflection on materialism, the fragility of human relationships and the global ecological crisis. Rather than offering a closed narrative, it is an invitation to a shared ritual of concentration, perseverance and spiritual regeneration through sound.
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Chris Pitsiokos

• Born in New York and now based in Berlin, he is a saxophonist, composer, improviser, writer and organiser. He has never been interested in genre classifications, although his music has been described as noise, jazz, free jazz, musique concrète, improvised music, art rock, new music, sound art, brutal prog and electroacoustic music.
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  • As a bandleader and solo artist, he has toured across Asia, the Americas and Europe, performing at festivals including the Sapporo International Art Festival, Moers Festival, Jazz Jantar in Poland, Lima Jazz Festival, Unlimited Music Festival in Wels, Jazz Festival Saalfelden, Meteo Mulhouse Festival, Jazz Cerkno and The Observatory in Singapore. In New York, his music has been presented at Roulette Intermedium, ISSUE Project Room and during a residency at The Stone. His writing has appeared in Arcana, edited by John Zorn, and in a Japanese-language book on Kaoru Abe. His projects include solo saxophone recitals, the evolving audiovisual work Irrational Rhythms and Shifting Poles, the band CP Unit and a long-running duo with Otomo Yoshihide. He has collaborated with artists including Axel Dörner, Keiji Haino, Mazen Kerbaj, Tony Buck, Nate Wooley, Peter Evans, Chris Corsano and Tyshawn Sorey.
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• He has recorded around 40 albums as a leader or co-leader. As an organiser, he independently produced more than 100 concerts in New York between 2013 and 2022. After moving to Berlin, he co-curated the programme at Sowieso between 2022 and 2023, and in 2024 co-founded the Richten25 venue and Odamusic e.V. In 2025, he established the Hard Listening Festival — a Berlin festival dedicated to exploratory music and non-music.
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• The project is supported by the British Council.