Latitudes’ Max Andrews, a curator, writer and lifelong birder, recently conducted the podcast “Minor” Ornithologies for TBA21 on st_age (Season 4, Episode 4). The podcast’s guests are Alex Holt, a spokesperson for Bird Names for Birds, a movement to decolonise bird names, and zoömusicologist Dr Hollis Taylor who specialises in birdsong. Through their perspectives, we glimpse new and speculative kinds of human–bird narratives – what Anna-Sophie Springer and Etienne Turpin have coined “minor ornithologies”. 

The interviews are complemented by two audio clips, one of a Pied Butcherbird recorded in N Queensland, and another of a Superb Lyrebird mimicking birdsong and two flute phrases recorded in New South Wales, both courtesy of Hollis Taylor.

This edition accompanies Laia Estruch’s performance “Ocells Perduts V67” (2022) also produced by TBA21 on st_age, and takes flight into the realm of birds, looking at politics and practices that disrupt dominant historical narratives, and exceed scientific and cultural boundaries.

→ RELATED CONTENT:

• Laia Estruch’s “Ocells Perduts” (2021) in the exhibition “Panorama 21: Apunts per a un incendi dels ulls” and four open rehearsals, Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA), October 2021–February 2022.
• Laia Estruch performs “Mix” (2021–ongoing” at PUBLICS, Helsinki, March 2022.
• Cover Story, April 2022: Mix & Match: Laia Estruch at PUBLICS, 1 Apr 2022
• Panorama in Madrid and Córdoba, 14 June 2022
• Laia Estruch performs “Ocells Perduts V67” (2022) on the river banks of the Guadalquivir river in the city of Córdoba, as part of “Pasaje del agua | The Journeying Stream”, a programme jointly convened by TBA21 and TBA21–Academy.
• Cuerpos de voz conversation between Laia Estruch and TBA21 Chief Curator Soledad Gutiérrez.