Souffle Continu
Chapel: 21 February – 19 April 2026
Sunflowers
Gallery 3: 21 February – 19 July 2026
Tarek Atoui is a Lebanese sound artist and composer based in Paris known for his innovative approach to sound, performance, and instrument-making. His work explores the physicality of sound and the act of listening, creating immersive experiences that challenge traditional boundaries between artist, audience, and instrument. Atoui frequently collaborates with musicians, instrument makers, and people with diverse hearing abilities, emphasising inclusivity and experimentation.
Atoui’s exhibition at IMMA is presented in two phases, comprising an installation, titled Souffle Continu, in the Chapel that focuses on the tactile quality of the sound, vibration, and movement of “wind instruments”; and in the gallery spaces Sunflowers presents a series of works inspired by the rhythmic and material traditions of Korean drumming.
For the installation Souffle Continu, Atoui has created Wind Houses that link hearing, touch, and sight. These are listening and performance spaces which also serve as musical instruments. As is the case with a flute, air is divided by a bevelled board, thus producing low sounds that resonate throughout the body and in the surrounding space. The organs within the space are sculptural installations that combines research into church pipe organs with the sonic experiences of deaf people. It consists of a network of tubes which connect a computer with an air blower, and various organ modules which interact with each other in such a way that their sounds constantly adapt to each other.
In the gallery spaces Atoui’s new works Sunflowers are influenced by Korean drumming tradition, the spaces will be designed as both listening space and places for the audience to make their own material through workshops. Atoui’s work plays with improvisation, activation and listening that immerses the audiences in unprecedented sensory and cognitive experiences. His work opens up new channels of imagination and knowledge that are challenging and embrace experimentation.
The exhibition will be punctuated by a programme of live performances and workshops. Tarek Atoui will perform on 20 February as part of the exhibition launch. A second performance by invited musicians Natalia Beylis, Áine O’Dwyer, Meabh McKenna, and Willie Stewart takes place on 21 March.
Presented in association with the French Embassy in Ireland.
About the Artist
Tarek Atoui (Beirut, Lebanon, 1980; lives and works in Paris) is an artist and electroacoustic composer who explores the medium of sound and the way it gives shape to perceptions through dynamic installations, experimental acoustic environments, and collaborative performances. The artist works with composers and craftsmen from different countries to invent complex instruments with strong sculptural halos. By bringing together a wide range of materials and knowledge he tests the acoustic properties and the unique ways in which elements like bronze, water, glass and stone transmit and reflect sound. Using custom-built electronic instruments and computers, Atoui references current social and political realities, revealing music and new technologies as powerful aspects of expression and identity. Education and social connection are integral aspects of the artist’s practice that often collaborate with different local communities and invites the visitor to interact and experience his multi-sensory environments.
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