I am a performance maker and sound artist based in Budapest, focusing on spatial-relational practices.
Using simple elements, structures, and instructions, I compose performative experiences that evoke connectedness with one’s attention, body, surroundings, and the people around them. In other words, I aim to create profound experiences from the things that are already there.
My pieces take the form of sound choreographies, sound theatre pieces, participatory works, and site-responsive installations. The performative use of spatial sound is central to my artistic language. With a toolkit consisting of several dozen portable speakers, I’ve developed a unique flexibility in composing spatial sound, creating highly adaptable and interactive sonic environments.
I often work in site-specific and public space contexts. My performances, installations, and interventions have appeared in diverse locations, including foot tunnels, underground stations, public squares, forests, Turkish baths, abandoned offices and factories, mining museums, synagogue gardens, ancient monuments, and private flats. These works fully immerse the audience, offering spaces to experience collective presence and attention.
All of my works require active participation to varying degrees—ranging from pieces centered around audience interaction to situations that invite high-intensity contemplation on the nuances of the perception. I aim to create frameworks where there are no right or wrong decisions, allowing the actions of the audience to manifest in a deeply personal and human way.
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Dávid Somló’s work has appeared around the world — e.g. in the programme of: Prague Quadriennale (CZ) / Festival d'Avignon (FR) / Passage Festival (DK) / FiraTárrega (ES) / D-CAF (EG) / Festival XS Bruxelles (BE) / 4+4 Days in Motion Festival (CZ) / FIME Sao Paolo (BR) / Istanbul Fringe (TR) / Sonorities (NIR) / Mais Imaginarius (PT) / Montag Modus (GER) / UH Festival (HU) / Placcc Festival (HU).
He is an associate artist of public space performance network IN SITU and Placcc Festival. In 2024-2025 he is a participant of the ‘Green Streets of Europe’ residency series.
SELECTED PRESS // PORTFOLIO // CV
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Dávid Somló holds an Mmus in Creative Composition from Goldsmiths College, London and an MA in Sociology from ELTE, Budapest and finished his Phd-in-practice research at the Hungarian University of Fine Arts. His dissertation, titled ‘Transdisciplinary Approaches of Spatiality in Performance’, explores the compositional and performative aspects of spatiality.
He has been holding workshops internationally and he is one of the lead teacher of the Performance Studies course at the FreeSZFE, teaching site-specific practices, interdisciplinary composition and the performativity of sound.
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I used to play guitar in a Congolese Soukus band in a Cameroonian restaurant, in Deptford. Usually there was a man there called Honore Haliman, who made videos of African concerts in London. One night, he came up to me during a cigarette brake and said:
“I’ve seen your videos on Facebook – the “Space Between Us”, and that one in the tunnel. You’re crazy. I don’t understand.”He thought a bit.
“Ok. I understand. You try to make people pay attention to things that they usually don’t.”