jess robinson

Jess Robinson is a Pākehā sound artist, performer and composer based in Graz, Austria, originally from Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa/New Zealand. Her practice includes free improvisation, experimental composition, installation work and new musical instrument design. In her live performances she works with livecoding, cello, voice, DIY electronics and found objects. She is interested in using sound to explore connections to place, and investigating relationships between listeners, players, instruments, bodies and spaces. Her recent work has explored ideas around re-imagined landscapes and embodiment through failure.

Jess is currently studying towards a Masters of Computer Music and Sound Art at the IEM at Kunstuniversität Graz with Gerhard Eckel. She received the Edwin Carr Foundation Scholarship 2025 toward her studies in Austria. Before moving to Graz, she worked as an acoustics engineer in environmental noise, room acoustics and building acoustics. She holds a conjoint Bachelor of Music (Composition) and Bachelor of Engineering with Honours (Mechatronics) from the University of Auckland, having studied with Dr Fabio Morreale, Dr Chris Gendall and Dr Leonie Holmes. Her compositions have been workshopped by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, NZTrio, Auckland Philharmonia, and the Jade Quartet.

In 2022 she won the UoA Protel Music Technology Prize for her work glitchcraft, an invented instrument that was featured at Ars Electronica Aotearoa 2022, NIME 2022, and the Australasian Computer Music Conference 2022. She performed with glitchcraft, other DIY electronics, cello and voice regularly at the Audio Foundation and Vitamin S between 2022 and 2025, having supported Jan-Bas Bollen (NL), Lea Bertucci (USA), There Are No More Four Seasons (SE) and Evicshen (USA) on their tours to Aotearoa.

Recently her performances have been featured at Audible Edge festival in Boorloo/Perth, Make It Up Club in Naarm/Melbourne, and Amalgam festival in Graz. She has performed with Luc Vítk in Tāmaki Makaurau NZ, Opava CZ, and Čadca SK. She is a member of the CMKK (Computermusik & Klang Kunst) collective in Graz.

Jess has had sound art installations presented at the Audio Foundation (July - August 2024) and at te Pū o te Wheke Gallery in Kaikohe (May 2024). Her work reflections/connections is an interactive installation using scavenged microphones and loudspeakers, encouraging visitors to explore a new environment using sound.

She has also collaborated with Dance Plant Collective on several projects, including A Floating Duet at the Whangārei Fringe Festival in October 2024. Jess composed and performed a semi-improvised cello score responding to the dancers' play between stability and instability on the pontoon on the lake at Whangārei Quarry Gardens.