Christopher Willes

Biography

Christopher Willes (b. 1986) is an artist, composer/musician, performance maker and facilitator based in so-called Canada. His work explores listening as both subject and practice. Working with people, sound, musical instruments, and embodied practices, his projects research how forms of participation, collective agency and assembly emerge. He creates performance works, music, exhibitions, audio artworks, recordings and publications, while also organizing workshops, curatorial projects, and other experimental gatherings. His work has been presented across Canada, USA, UK, in Europe, Scandinavia and Asia.

Christopher holds a Bachelor of Music from the University of Toronto and an MFA from Bard College (USA). He is a Chalmers Arts Fellow (CAN), a MacDowell Fellow (USA), and an affiliated researcher at the Milieux Institute (Montreal). From 2017-2024 he worked as an associate artist and company producer with Public Recordings in Toronto. He is currently completing studies in Conflict Mediation at the University of Waterloo.

Christopher’s projects take unconventional forms and are developed with other artists and community members through different collaborative processes and workshops. With Adam Kinner he co-created MANUAL, a one-on-one performance that’s staged covertly in public libraries, which premiered at OFFTA (Montreal) in 2022 and has since toured widely. Since 2014, he developed numerous projects with Public Recordings, including Resonance Gathering, a collectively authored publication on Pauline Oliveros (Art Metropole, 2023). He’s worked in dance and theatre for over a decade as a dramaturge, composer, and sound designer, with numerous projects presented worldwide. Active in experimental and improvised music since the mid-2000s, he performs on wind instruments, synthesizers, and electronics, and composes with various groups.

A significant part of Christopher’s practice is dedicated to organizing educational workshops, peer learning events and other community engaged projects. He has taught courses on collaborative practice, performance creation, and experimental music at institutions including Studio 303 (Montreal), the Toronto Dance Community Love-In, the University of Toronto, Concordia University (Montreal), Tramway (UK), Betonsalon (France). From 2017 to 2023, he was a recurring artist-in-residence at the Toronto Public Library, creating performances and workshops with teens and seniors. With Public Recordings he developed What’s Collective?, a workshop series shared internationally from 2019 to 2024. He also leads Collaborating Through Scores, an ongoing workshop at Studio 303 exploring the role of scores in group processes.

Contact:
info@christopherwilles.com
Instagram: @christopherwilles