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My book about the history of STEIM has just come off the press, it is published via Goldsmiths Press London in September 2026.

It’s a result of years of research in the (highly rudimentary) archives of STEIM, the Studio for Electro-Instrumental Music in Amsterdam. For 50 years (1969–2020) that place was a beehive of people building their own instruments, chasing an improvised, hands-on way of making electronic music. I built my first Fello prototype there, almost 20 years ago now. And I got hooked on the place itself, all the stories of artists and engineers who passed through, all of them obsessed with the same question: how do we 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘺 sound technology instead of trying to control it? They called this idea Touch, as coined by Michel Waisvisz who was the beating heart of the studio. This book is my attempt to unpack what that term meant and why it also might matter now.
Huge thanks to all artists who shared their memories in our interviews, to Kristina Andersen who let me work extensively in the Michel Waisvisz archive, and especially to Atau Tanaka, who invited me into the Sonics Series he curates. 

https://www.gold.ac.uk/goldsmiths-press/publications/the-steim-touch/
https://www.thalia.de/shop/home/artikeldetails/A1075574758 
https://www.amazon.de/STEIM-Touch-Goldsmiths-Press-Sonics/dp/1915983452

I have studied Applied Cultural Sciences with majors in musicology and linguistics and received a PhD in philosophy at Leuphana University Lueneburg in 2017. The embodied entanglements between hand and artificial sound generation are the key focus of my research, in history as well as the present moment. I pursue this research as artist, academic and lecturer.

  • 2026: Book release: The STEIM Touch. The Emergence of Sensor-Based Musical Instruments. Goldsmiths Press.
  • 2024: Keynote Speaker at the NIME Conference, New Interfaces for Musical Expression. "What else is there - 40 years of The Hands by Michel Waisvisz", together with Kristina Andersen
  • 2020: Lecturer at the University of Basel, Dept. of Media Studies. Subject: Sound Cultures, mediality of electronic music.
  • 2017 PhD 'summa cum laude' in philosophy (Cultural Sciences) at Leuphana Lueneburg (German): “Dutch Touch. Das SensorLab und The Hands als elektro-instrumentale Pionierentwicklungen des STEIM in den Jahren 1984-2000“
  • 2014-2018: Lecturer at Humboldt University Berlin (Dept. of Musicology)
  • Since 2012: Artistic/ academic lecturer in regular “Toolbox” project weeks at HKB Bern (CH), topics: "Repetition is Change”, "Mimikry, Mimesis & Camouflage".
  • 2011: Lecturer at MHMK in Hamburg, subject: audio technologies
  • Since 2009: Lecturer at HKB Bern (CH), subject: media theories, field recording
  • 2009: Lecturer at Leuphana University Lueneburg, subject: musical interfaces
  • 2009: Research associate at ((audio)), Leuphana University Lueneburg
  • 2008: Master in Applied Cultural Sciences at Leuphana University Lueneburg. Majors: Musicology and Linguistics.
Prototype of The Web at STEIM
hkb bern students

Writings (Selection)