The MARes in Hybrid Arts program of the Department of Audio & Visual Arts, Ionian University, cordially invites all interested parties to attend the public defense of the following Master's thesis:
Thesis Title: Bioelectric Signaling as Pre-linguistic Musicality: A compositional practice emerging from the agency of humans and weakly electric fish
Candidate: Sophia Osbanova
Supervisor: Iannis Zannos
Date & Time: Tuesday, 3 March 2026 — 15:00 (Athens time)
Join via Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/81057691878?pwd=tdOoEVvgkhtRTPl1xTVodtOHPR6a5b.1
Examination Committee
• Iannis Zannos — Professor, Department of Audio & Visual Arts, Ionian University (Supervisor)
• Adam Zaretsky — Visiting Lecturer, Department of Audio & Visual Arts, Ionian University
• Tania Tsiridou — Special Educational Personnel, Department of Audio & Visual Arts, Ionian University
About the Thesis
The project examines how the bioelectric discharges of weakly electric fish may be approached as pre-linguistic musicality — a form of organized time that is interaction- and context-sensitive without relying on symbolic semantics. It draws on 64-channel (8×8) multielectrode recordings from Vladimir M. Olshansky’s team and culminates in SENSUS, an orchestral work generated through a documented, repeatable remediation pipeline. Translation is treated as inherently non-neutral: each transformation is made explicit, and compositional agency is understood as distributed across the organism, measurement apparatus, algorithmic processing, collaborative decisions, and listening as a mode of inquiry.
About the Candidate
Sophia Osbanova is an interdisciplinary artist and curator of Russia’s interdisciplinary art database, holding a Bachelor’s in Medical Physics from Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University and a Master’s in Art & Science from ITMO University, whose practice investigates the organization of life, biosemiotics, and interspecies interactions.
Attendance
The defense is open to the public. Students, researchers, artists, and all interested individuals are welcome to attend.
MARes in Hybrid Arts
https://avarts.ionio.gr/mares/
