Sergei Tcherepnin (b. 1981) operates at the intersections of sound, sculpture, and theatre. Connecting computers and amplifiers to small surface transducers — devices that convert electrical signals into vibrations — he orchestrates complex multi-channel compositions in which objects (steel boxes, furniture, sheets of zinc and cardboard, photographs) are transformed into speakers. Often invoking queer, hybridized characters such as the “Listening Cactus”, the “Maize Mantis,” or the figure of the Pier Piper, Tcherepnin’s scenarios cultivate play between things and bodies, compelling the audience to develop a “score” for handling these animated objects. These interactions suggest new possibilities for intimacy with sound, where “listening” involves a more expansive state of activity: listening by touching, listening by opening, listening by feeling, listening by harnessing, or listening by walking. Tcherepnin trained as a composer under Maryanne Amacher, and studied music composition at Bard College at Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. Much of his work cultivates Amacher’s concept of the “difference tone,” which takes the human nervous system as an interface, and the ear as a neurophonic instrument which produces its own tones in response to external vibrations (and part of the role of the artwork is then to draw attention to these tones produced in the ear, to draw them out of subliminal existence.) As an integral member of Amacher’s research team, he recently collaborated on an exhibition of her archive presented at the DAAD Galerie Berlin, and a series of related performances in Berlin and at the Tate Modern, London.