Matthew Tomkinson

Artist in Residence, October 2022

Matthew Tomkinson is a writer, composer, and researcher based in Vancouver, on the ancestral and unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) and səl̓ilwətaɁɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) nations.

He received his PhD in Theatre Studies from the University of British Columbia, where he studied sound within the Deaf, Disability, and Mad arts. Working across a range of sonic practices, Matthew’s music for dance, theatre, and film has been presented internationally at festivals including the PuSh Performing Arts Festival (Vancouver), Festival du Nouveau Cinéma (Montreal), Craft Choreography (Vienna), and Tanzmesse (Düsseldorf).

His debut audiovisual album as Mathoms, The Woe Trumpets, is out with Decaying Spheres, along with an accompanying film that has been presented at the Sound Scene Festival (Washington, USA) and Chapeltown Picture House (Manchester, UK). Recent collaborators and commissions include Ballet BC, Company 605, Ace Co Pro, Kinesis Somatheatro, Magazinist, and the All Bodies Dance Project.

ZEITGEBER

ZEITGEBER is a research project that explores the phenomenon of entrainment. In this research, Matthew Tomkinson and Elissa Hanson focus on the way that external rhythmic time-cues, including social interaction, can affect one's biological rhythms. This research and performance is imagined as both a metaphor for, and a material example of, emotional self-regulation and co-regulation.

Drawing inspiration from Elissa's studies in trauma theory, ZEITGEBER is also envisioned as a practice in what some movement theorists call "kinaesthetic empathy," an interdisciplinary concept that refers to the cultivation of fellow feeling through movement. Some key areas of interest during their residency include entrainment, co-regulation, biological rhythms, participatory performance, and experimental electronic music.