BIOGRAPHY

Since everything is doomed to disappear, beings like works of art, only the moment of the encounter and what it creates interests me. Moment of doubt, adaptation, listening, testing, research. On the part of the artist as well as the spectator. To get rid of preconceived ideas and work to be free. Gwen Rouger

Gwen Rouger is the artistic director of the company ENTRE, for which she designs original, scenographically staged listening environments that place the relationship between herself and the audience—as both spectators and listeners—at the heart of the sensory experience. To this end, she composes what she terms "relational music," a form where the composition is intrinsically linked to the relationships evolving throughout the performance. A pianist and keyboardist, she composes pieces for prepared piano and keytar—repurposing this 1980s MIDI instrument—to create a hybrid sound that is both percussive and noise-oriented.

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Drawing inspiration from composers and artists such as John Cage, Pauline Oliveros, Max Neuhaus, Murray Schafer, Marcel Duchamp, Marina Abramović, Joseph Beuys, and many others, she creates scores that actively involve the audience—through specific actions or modes of listening—inviting them to play an active role with which she interacts live through her music. She was an artist-in-residence at the Cité des Arts (Paris, France) in 2015–2016 and at the Akademie Schloss Solitude (Stuttgart, Germany) in 2016–2017, and will be in residence at the Théâtre de Vanves (Hauts-de-Seine) as an associate composer under the DGCA-SACEM program in 2025 and 2026.

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Her works have been featured at festivals such as Spor (Aarhus, Denmark), Ear to the Ground (Ghent, Belgium), Switch (Théâtre de Vanves, France), MEN (Wrocław, Poland), Rainy Days Festival (Luxembourg), Borealis (Bergen, Norway), Archipel Genève (Switzerland), Passage Transfestival (Metz, France), Journée du Matrimoine (Ici l'onde-CNCM Dijon, France), Festival Aujourd'hui Musiques (L'Archipel, Scène nationale de Perpignan, France), Printemps de la création musicale (CCAM Scène Nationale de Vandoeuvre, France), and Festival In-situ (CNCM Césaré, Reims, France)...