Photo by Naira Expósito

Home-made Microphone (2009)

Juan Matos Capote is a sound and visual artist. He is currently a doctorate (PhD) candidate in Sound Art at Facultad de Bellas Artes in Cuenca, University of Castilla La Mancha, Spain. He teaches Arts.

He began to work in the nineties with perception and the senses, employing different strategies to counterpart ocularcentrism. He soon started to incorporate sound in his works by building his own electronic sound devices. He applies circuit bending and more orthodox techniques to build oscillators and to modify radios and other electronic devices, which he often connects in different configurations to create new systems of expression. Most of his systems are characterized by random, yet controllable, behaviours. 

He bases his sound vocabulary on fragmentary and dry textural qualities, using an abundance of high frequencies to construct his pieces. His works have been described as having both a somewhat raw and direct quality and a subtle structure. When improvising, he focuses on what he calls a vertical perspective rather than on a horizontal, or linear, narrative. This strategy allows him to conceptualize sound in spatial terms more than in temporal ones and, when put into practice, enables him to decelerate the fast and fleeting sound output of his home-made electronic devices. Failure and success are at the heart of his introspection.

Currently, Matos Capote's interests are related to the social and cultural aspects of sound and how to extend the everyday into aesthetics experiences. 

He has exhibited and played at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center (MoMA) (New York); Esso Gallery (New York); Gigantic ArtSpace (New York); STEIM (Amsterdam); Cafe OTO (London); Instituto Cervantes (Berlin); Massey University (New Zealand); Dak'art 2008 Biennial Off (Senegal); Sydney Non Objective (SNO) (Australia); La Casa Encendida (Madrid); Museu d'Art Contemporany de Barcelona (MACBA); Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona (CCCB); Arts Santa Monica (Barcelona); Espai Ubu (Barcelona); Centre d'Art La Panera (Lleida); Centro de Arte La Recova (Tenerife); Museo de la Naturaleza y el Hombre (Tenerife); Auditorio Adán Martín (Tenerife); Auditorio Alfredo Kraus (Gran Canaria); San Antonio Abad, Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno (Gran Canaria); among others.