Aviva Endean is an artist dedicated to fostering a deep engagement with (and care for) sound and music, with the hope that attentive listening can connect people with each other and their environment. She is active as a clarinetist, composer, improviser, curator, sound artist, performance-maker and collaborator.
In 2021, Aviva is in residence at the Peggy-Glanville Hicks composers house on Gadigal land, in Paddington, NSW.
Her debut solo release cinder : ember : ashes featuring improvisations and original compositions was released on Norwegian label SOFA in 2018 to critical acclaim, with reviews speaking to Aviva’s innovation and virtuosity, and describing the work as ‘captivating, sophisticated, stunning, miraculous’ & ‘trance-inducing’.
Aviva regularly works across a range of contexts including experimental and improvised music, new chamber music, creating theatre works which are designed to be listened to, and working on cross-disciplinary collaborations. Her work seeks to work beyond the boundaries of her art form, to reimagine the possibilities of a practice with sound.
As a composer and performance maker, Aviva often explores expanding the audience experience of sound by creating unusual, spatially engaged, and participatory contexts for listening. Her recent original work in this area include Ping Pong Pop a game piece for live spinning contrabass clarinet player, audience and ping pong balls (Dark MOFO), Sonic Labyrinth an immersive and interactive sound journey for children and adults alike (Castlemaine State festival/Art Play), Domicile a performance installation work inhabiting a family home (New Music Network mini series), Intimate Sound Immersion, a performance for one blindfolded person at a time (You Are Here festival), In the Half Light, a show for solo clarinet and immersive lighting design (ASTRA Chamber Music society) and A Face Like Yours a sound work for video, foam earplugs and viewer (Darwin Festival, Sydney Contemporary Art Fair)
Aviva is also active as a collaborator on interdisciplinary projects. She recently created an electro-acoustic sound design for Chunky Move’s large scale immersive performance work Token Armies for the Melbourne International festival 2019. Her work was also featured in films Assembly by Angelica Mesiti for the Australian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale 2019, and The Empyrean by Amiel-Courtin Wilson. Other collaborative projects have included work with some of Australia’s most exciting arts organisations and festivals, including The Australian Art Orchestra, Chamber Made, ASTRA, Punctum Live Arts, Ensemble Offspring, ELISION, TURA, Slave Pianos, Madeleine Flynn and Tim Humphrey, Geoff Robinson and Musica Viva. She has created work for festivals and concert series including Metropolis, INLAND, MONA FOMA Bendigo International Festival of Exploratory Music, WOMAD, Liquid Architecture, COMA, Dark MOFO, Melbourne International Jazz Festival, and The Melbourne Festival.
Aviva is the recipient of numerous Awards including the prestigious Freedman Music Fellowship (2015) and the APRA/AMCOS Art music award (2020) . She has been a finalist for The Melbourne Prize, the EG music Awards ‘Best Avant-garde/Experimental act’ (2013 & 2018), and the Aria Awards ‘Best World Music album’ (2014). Her work with Justin Marshall ‘I Am Hear’ was awarded Best Kids Work at the Melbourne Fringe festival (2018).
Aviva was the inaugural recipient of the Australian Art Orchestra’s ‘Pathfinder’ Music Leadership program, which offered her a one-year Associate Artist position with the company. Her other positions have included teaching as Monash University, working as ‘Emerging Artist in Residence’ with both Chamber Made and ASTRA chamber music society, and Associate Artist for the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity (Canada).
Aviva acknowledges that her practice has been developed on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri, Boonwurrung and Gadigal people. She commits to working respectfully to honour ongoing cultural and spiritual connections to country, as well as elders, past, present and future.
“Astonishing beauty…uncharted musical lands”
Sydney Morning Herald
“a finely tuned curatorial sensibility”
Liza Lim, Partial Durations
“A miraculous discovery of a new world”
Freistil Magazin
“Sophisticated solo improvisations from one of the most varied and accomplished artists of Australia’s younger generations.”
on ‘cinder : ember : ashes’ Joe O’Connor, Loudmouth
“Inhalations and exhalations suddenly sculpted into meaning bearing forms”
Peter Knight, Artistic Director, Australian Art Orchestra
For media portfolio, CV and press images for download please follow the following links: