Artist Spotlight is our regular feature introducing you to Cities and Memory artists around the world with an in-depth interview. In this edition, we introduce you to Sardinian sound artist and creator of fascinating spoken word-led Cities and Memory compositions Cristina Marras, who intriguingly describes herself as “an unreliable narrator”.

I love a good story, ideally with a twist at the end, even better if told by an unreliable narrator. I really like the challenge of taking listeners on a surprising journey, almost forcing a double take (“Did I really hear that?”), leaving them puzzled and entertained. Mainly because this is how I would like to feel when I listen.

Apparently, I have a very distinctive style in my creations, and several people (on opposite sides of the globe) have recently told me with almost identical words that they would recognise a piece of mine anywhere. Which I guess is a good thing, but also makes me feel a bit uneasy, because I fool myself into thinking of being unpredictable and ever surprising, and I try very hard.

For example, after contributing to Phoebe McIndoe’s Small Audio Art with a series of lyrical and poetical pieces, each inspired by a simple household object (front door, window), for the third prompt (wooden spoon) I sent in what sounds like a cheap YouTube tutorial, complete with obnoxious corporate music, on the obscure craft of wooden spoon carving. But as listeners deepen into the piece, they realise that the “Step-by-Step Guide on Wooden Spoon Carving” is an obscure, yet weirdly specific, confession, that takes them from a seemingly unemotional topic into a deeply personal and intimate space, leaving them at the end with some very useful advice, just not necessarily on carving wooden spoons.

I am constantly trying to push the boundaries, to subvert the narration, to boycott and escape storytelling, because it comes too easily to me, and I try to achieve this by, for example, creating an ominous atmosphere and then ending with a joyous, radiant note (I was the first), discussing editing choices directly with the listener (Every Library in My Life), subverting the unspoken rule that the artist chooses the language in which to create (I am a Podcaster), or building elaborate worlds made of memories, only to reveal in the end that they are nothing but lies (I’d rather not put an example here, not to spoil the effect).

The interview continues below ⬇️, and this map collects together all of Cristina’s contributions to Cities and Memory: 

There is the sound of swallows diving and chasing each other in front of my window on summer mornings; then the sound of gentle waves on the beach, coming from afar, like from another world, when you are lying on the sand.

There is also the sound of the wind, very strong on mistral days, a wind so strong that it makes the oak trees grow bent, almost parallel to the ground, a wind that cleans the air and is very noisy when it funnels through the narrow streets of the old town, a wind I still haven’t managed to record properly (but I haven’t given up yet). And there is the sound of people strolling in the evening, chatting, the clinking of glasses with aperitifs and laughter.

And then there is the sound of Sputnik and Mazinga, my cats who accompany me wherever I go, and with their purring always know when I need some cuddles.

A cheap battery-operated transistor radio was my faithful companion under the bedsheet as a child, when my mother screamed to switch the light off. I used to listen religiously to the programs on the Italian public radio, which ended with ‘The Midnight Story,’ then I would switch to programs in increasingly incomprehensible languages as the night went on, bringing under my covers programs in Arabic, French, and English, none of which I didn’t understand anything, of course, but I loved their musicality.

For my tenth birthday, I received a tape recorder, and that’s when I started recording my own show, complete with advertisements. Unfortunately, none of those cassette tapes survive today. I only started working professionally on radio when I was living in Melbourne (Australia), first at a commercial radio station, and then in the public broadcaster SBS, and that’s where I learnt the craft, undergoing professional training provided by the sister broadcaster ABC.

Once I had learnt the basics, I started immediately experimenting and trying to subvert the narrative. I remember going on air with a program in which I read fantastic descriptions of the marvellous bazaars of the city of Basra, with suggestive music and soundscapes, a few days after the United States started bombing Iraq in 2003. And when my weekly show fell exactly one year after September 11, weary of the rampant rhetoric, I started my program by talking about the anniversary of the death of thousands of people killed by an inhuman act of terrorism, only to reveal at the end that I was actually referring to the coup d’état in Chile on September 11, 1973.

My little rebellions were more stylistic than political — I simply couldn’t stand the banality of giving listeners exactly what they expected. Let’s just say that the ten years I spent making radio programs were not without controversy. The predetermined formats felt too tight for me, and having learned everything technical that they could teach me, I found myself with a lot of free time, and out of boredom I built soundscapes and plotted small rebellions through content and form.

But, somehow, I found myself in the right place at the right time. In those early 2000s, Radio National, a channel of the Australian ABC, had the Creative Audio Unit, an incredible audio experimentation program led by Julie Shapiro that focused on producing innovative and experimental sound works, blending storytelling, sound art, and documentary techniques to push the boundaries of traditional radio and audio broadcasting.

I owe who I am today as an audio creator to the countless hours of continuous and uninterrupted listening to the works broadcast by Radio National on its two programs — Radiotonic and Soundproof — where they explored new ways of engaging listeners through immersive and unconventional audio experiences. And it was precisely on Radio National that my first audio creation as an independent producer was broadcast, commissioned by Radiotonic, with the unforgettable Jesse Cox as producer (Consider the Lobster). In the years when the podcast revolution was beginning, the Creative Audio Unit introduced me to the best English-language creators, helping to shape my style and mould my taste which, alas, remains very demanding when it comes to audio, starting with my own production.

Give me a computer with Logic Pro and then forget about me. I love editing. Editing is my passion, my therapy, my lifesaver in times of sorrow and sadness. When I edit, I forget time, I forget myself, I lose myself in the search for the perfect mix, the perfect nuance, the perfect sound.

I dedicate obsessive care to editing, seeking precision and rigor even in the smallest and most hidden details. If I mention the fall of the Berlin Wall (Berlin 1989) and a Trabant (the iconic car of the DDR) appears, you can be sure that the engine sound in the background is not just any car, but precisely that of a Trabant. And if I talk about the Sardinian countryside (Sardinia, Which is Like Nowhere), you can be certain that what you hear are the bells and the bleats of an authentic Sardinian flock.

I recall abandoning the listening of an Italian radio drama — which was otherwise captivating — when the Italian protagonist went to an Italian party and, in the background noise, I could perfectly recognise that the people were speaking English. I don’t have time for laziness. It doesn’t matter if my research takes hours, or if I have to create the sound myself, I never take shortcuts with sound.

And I like to build it in intricate layers, so that listening is a rich, all-pervading experience that lends itself to multiple visitations.

One of my favourite creations at the moment is “Gigi Riva and I”. It’s about Gigi Riva, the Italian soccer player who “led the very modest soccer team of Cagliari to win the Serie A championship in the 1969–70 season.”

But when you start listening, you realise very soon that it is not a story about sport; it paints a picture of Riva not just as a talented player, but as a demigod, his name whispered with reverence and his deeds immortalised everywhere.

Actually, it is a story about childhood, wonder, memories, and (a bit) about mischievous revenge. I had wanted to tell this story for a long time, and I started writing it (I always start writing a script on paper) years ago. It was a story important to me, and I didn’t want to rush it.

When I had finally completed the script, the unthinkable happened: Gigi Riva passed away, leaving a nation in mourning. I am not exaggerating when I say that in Sardinia public days of mourning were declared, and for weeks all Sardinian and national media talked about nothing else. At that point, I took a step back: I didn’t want my audio piece to end up in the mix of opportunists, the sharks looking for that photo taken next to Riva to ride the wave of the moment.

So I put everything on hold and only resumed working on the piece many, many months later. I am very attached to Gigi Riva and I because it gave me the chance to talk about my childhood, a recurrent theme in my work, and to do it exactly the way I like, in a disarming way. But I prefer not to reveal too much so as not to spoil it.

One contribution to Cities and Memory that is particularly dear to me is “Trailblazing Astronaut Robert H. Lawrence Jr.”, created for the Shortwave Transmissions project. It starts from the real shortwave audio from the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster to tell the story of Robert H. Lawrence Jr., a United States Air Force officer and the first African-American astronaut. He had a remarkable life, with amazing achievements, but is almost forgotten by history.

The piece was inspired by an installation by artist Tavares Strachan that I saw at the 2019 Venice Biennale and that stayed with me long after the exhibition. When I was given the opportunity to work with the shortwave recording, I immediately thought of that artwork and how to connect it with Lawrence’s story. The fact that the piece is narrated by my son, Romeo Maria Minutolo, makes it really special to me.

One of the pieces that come to mind is “The only animal that can speak?”, a documentary by Katie Revell that I had the fortune to listen to when it was premiered at Lucia Festival 2024. (If you don’t know the Lucia Festival, I urge you to program a visit – organised by Radio Papesse, it takes place every two years in Florence, usually between 12-15 of December, and it offers the best showcase of international audio creations. If you go, you’ll find me there as I give a hand to my Radio Papesse friends.)

Katie’s piece is a creative audio documentary exploring questions of voice and listening from scientific, artistic, philosophical, and political perspectives, in a way that is poignant, poetical, surprising, and incredibly engaging. I have to confess that after listening to it the first time, I felt like running to look for the first field of cows and lying there with them.

Another super interesting piece that I listened to (again) recently is “In One Ear and Out the Other”  by Tim Hinman. How can I describe it? Imagine the 1966 movie Fantastic Voyage, in which a group of scientists shrank and injected themselves into a human body. That’s more or less the vibe, plus lots of meta conversations and real scientific discussions aimed at answering one simple and banal question: where does the sound go after it enters your ear. One Tim Hinman takes a bizarre trip inside the brain to follow the sound, while another Tim Hinman stays outside in the studio (someone needs to check the recording levels, right?). Along the way, we hear real scientific descriptions of what actually happens to the sound inside our head and mind. It’s almost a real-time reportage from inside a living brain, with an incredibly sophisticated sound design. Trust me: you won’t forget any time soon the sound and the consistency of a neuron squashed in a hand. Unforgettable! It’s one of those pieces that I can listen to over and over again, and every time I think, I wish I had done it.

I love the sound of gentle waves breaking onto the beach in summer, while children play in the background. It is the sound of my childhood, and it is uncanny how it magically comes back every time I close my eyes while lying at my favourite city beach in Cagliari.

I have recorded it many times, and I use it in my creations every time I can. I should actually catalogue them, but then I wouldn’t have the excuse to go to the beach next time I want to use that special effect.

I have to say that it’d be my old Tascam R05. I am unable to part with it. Even after upgrading to a more expensive Tascam 44WL (with wifi capability!), I still keep on preferring the old R05. It is not just because I know all its functions by heart and I am too lazy to read the instruction manual of the 44WL (which is in part true, I hate reading instruction manuals).

I think that the main reason is that, for some unfathomable decision of the constructors, the 44WL doesn’t allow me to easily record my voice in mono, which is what I need for my creations. I have tried everything, explored every forum, but apparently it is not possible (actually, if some nerd out there has a suggestion, please let me know).

Another beloved (but alas lost) piece of equipment was the Sennheiser AMBEO Binaural Recording Headset that I could plug straight into my iPhone to record amazing surrounding sounds. I paid for it a fraction of what I paid for my micro binaural Thomann Soundman OKM II, and I would say that the sound is actually comparable. I lost them on the way to the airport in Valencia. They don’t produce them anymore, and those that I found online cost about ten times more. Sigh!

I am currently in the process of finalising two pieces. The first one is the one I started creating during THE ECCO retreat, where I was proud to be part of the second cohort. THE ECCO is one of those amazing initiatives that champions a kind of audio narration that goes beyond the predominant US-centric model (think This American Life), giving space to different ways of narration, using not necessarily and not only the English language. During the retreat, we collaborated, experimented, and created deep connections. Now we are in the final phase of giving each other feedback and finalizing the pieces that will be premiered in autumn in the UK and in Berlin.

I am also putting the final touches on my very first piece in German, a language in which I am fluent (I have a degree in German language and literature and I have lived almost a decade in Berlin). Somehow, it never occurred to me that I could also use German in my audio work, instead of creating almost exclusively in English and occasionally in Italian.

The opportunity was given to me by fellow THE ECCO participant and German producer Judith Geffert, who commissioned me to create a piece for the new program “Doku Drops,” a fantastic audio series produced by Deutschlandfunk Kultur, a renowned German public radio station known for its high-quality cultural programming. Doku Drops is their brand new innovative series that showcases compelling documentary audio stories that captivate listeners with immersive storytelling and unique perspectives. I’m thrilled to be part of this inspiring project and look forward to sharing my contribution soon.