Braga is already part of Sarah Washington and Knut Aufermann's traveling map. Known as Mobile Radio in the art world, the duo emerged in 2005 as a mobile project that traveled around Europe to spread the concept of Radio Art. With over 25 years of experience and being responsible for producing radio art for more than 50 radio stations worldwide, Sarah and Knut have taken on the artistic direction of festivals such as Radio Revolten (2016) and Radio Art Zone (2022), and are co-founders of the Resonance FM station and the international network Radia.

After a long train journey from Germany, the duo arrived in Braga to join two cultural projects of the city - Braga 25 and Circuito - presenting artistic proposals that challenge the community to explore the public space and immerse themselves in the city's visual and sound landscape.

On the railway journey that brought them to Portugal, Sarah and Knut noticed that most people use the screen as an instrument of distraction, losing the spatial and temporal sense of the environment and landscapes around them. From this idea of dissociation, the pair accepted the challenge of Braga 25 - Portuguese Capital of Culture and created a proposal for the ‘Connecting Commutes’ project - a programme coordinated by Luís Pinto, which invites sound artists to design sensory, narrative and experimental installations for the city's buses. Using these vehicles as the centerpiece of their artistic concept, Mobile Radio present acoustic work that battles contemporary digital temptation and challenges the community to look at what lies beyond the screen and the bus windows. This work will be available on 24 March and will circulate around the city until 28 September.

But this is not the only reason for the duo to return to our country. In addition to their visit to Braga, Sarah and Knut will take another challenge of the BMA lab cycle organized by Circuito – Braga Media Arts Educational Service and present the workshop ‘International Radio Art Laboratory’. Divided into two days (15 and 22 March), the activity invites participants to create a collective radio artwork to be broadcast on 28 stations around the world. In the first session (held at gnration), they will present Radia, an international network co-founded by the duo, leading to a discussion on the themes to be worked on in the radio programme. In the following session (at Shopyard's headquarters), participants are invited to present short original recordings - whether music or field recordings - and select extracts to create a complete work to be broadcast on the network a few weeks later. The workshop is already sold out.

Learn more about the duo's proposals at bragamediaarts.com and braga25.pt.

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BMA lab is supported by the Portuguese Republic - Culture / Directorate-General for the Arts - RTCP - Portuguese Network of Theatres and Cinemas.