Research interests are history, society, ethics and identity.
Bradley (born Iran) is an artist who thinks with sound. Mostly making work, often silent, about the act of listening. Bradley’s practice seeks to question our sense of self, our place within society and nature as a whole. Listening is bound up with memory, self-awareness and what Anahid Kassabian called “distributed subjectivity.”
For Bradley, the concept of sound is taken at its broadest comprehension; as language, music or noise, as internal noise, particularly the tensions around interiority in urban landscapes. The comprehension includes sound that is beyond our hearing, but not beyond our bodily perception, Bradley works on the premise that such sound can even constitute noise pollution, as per her doctoral research titled “New Ears for New Noise.
Methodologies include “practice as research”, e.g. phenomenological performances, a style of broadcast (discussion as research and oral history), sculptures that draw you in e.g. totems, signage, and more-than immersive installations. Bradley’s style involves improvisation, experimentalism, deep listening, evolving modes of communication and reception.
The sculptures are made with found or domestic objects, textiles, electronics, paper, or traditional forms of art used to either literally transmit noise or as silent works that transmit the idea of sound. Bradley’s live performances stage inter-plays between the body, architecture, geography, time and scale, and history (linear and non linear time) in order to position the audience as the site of the work.
For Bradley the materiality of a work is, as per the philosophy of Canadian theorist Marshall McLuhan, also the ‘massage‘, the opiate for the human sensorium.
Biography
Bradley has studied and qualified in these areas which feed into her practice: classical Indian and European music, composition, languages, conservation, journalism and radio production.
Current: post-graduate studies (PhD) towards a practice-based doctorate in sound art, at The Centre for Creative Research into Sound Arts Practice (CRiSAP), University of the Arts London.
Broadcasting at sound-arts station Resonance104.4FM since 2005, Bradley composed for and performed with the improvising Resonance Radio Orchestra (Gasworks, Camden Roundhouse, Pestival, Southbank Centre etc.). Working with digital sound, graphic scores and radiophonics, Bradley produces experimental broadcasts both live in the studio and on location such as Venice Agendas (Venice Biennial), MIMA MIddlesborough, Tate UBS Weekends, Art Dubai 2013-14, Frieze Art Fair 2006-2010, the Z&Z ship on the Thames, Hayward Gallery Southbank reopening, Void Gallery for European Capital City of Culture, N. Ireland, and more.
Bradley’s written research is published e.g. in The Oxford Handbook of Sound Art, The Wire Magazine, Ibraaz online, Canvas Magazine,Al Tashkeel and more.
Collaborations
Bradley was a member of London noise-improv quartet Oscillatorial Binnage 2007-2017. Their seminal album Agitations: Post-Electronic Noise released on Sub Rosa, 2020. Live improvised performances include the first ever concerts at Cafe Oto, Merge Bankside Festival for ResonanceFM, Wellcome Trust, and Void Gallery, N. Ireland.
As the shared practice Bradley-Weaver, with sound artist and archivist Christopher John Weaver, Bradley researched place and history using acoustics and performance, since 2013.
Bradley-Weaver’s works are sound installations, musical performances, soundwalks and sculptures with accompanying discursive event programme.
Bradley-Weaver released the limited edition artist vinyl Systems for a Score on The Vinyl Factory, UK, recorded during a live installation of a recording studio they built in the gallery for the eponymous solo show at Tashkeel, Dubai. Their pieces were shown around the Persian Gulf, Levant, UAE, Bahrain, Lebanon, Kuwait, Pakistan, and Northwestern University, Qatar and Red Bull Radio Bass Camp, Dubai. Their works are in the Sharjah Art Foundation, Al Serkal Foundation, Lahore Biennial Foundation, Maraya Art Centre, six permanent sound installations in Al Leffayeh Wildlife Centre, Sharjah and in private collections.
Bradley-Weaver’s live, phenomenological performances include Circular Landscapes an iterative series commissioned by Maraya Arts Centre, performed at Al Qasba Theatre Sharjah, Al Serkal Avenue, Dubai and Maraya. Their electro-acoustic piece An unMuted Serving, on the politics of mealtimes in UAE was performed at Al Serkal Avenue, Beirut Arts Centre Sikka Art Fair, The Mine, Dubai, and Re-Use Festival, Kuwait.
Together Bradley-Weaver produced the experimental radio series “The Iron Speaks”, for the Sharjah Art Foundation on radio history in the UAE, and on Clocktower Radio, New York and on BBC Radio 4 Xtra, UK amongst other places.
Bradley has also performed experiemental music live for dance pieces, for example by artist Terry Smith, and performed live with Chris Weaver and Bob and Roberta Smith for the Irish Pavilion opening at Venice Biennial, amongst many others.
Sketch for an Artist's Statement, 2021
Solo work
Sculpture:
Designed to provoke active listening, Bradley’s works about sound range from sculptures as textiles, embroidery into found objects and lightboxes that might yet be silent, but work to invoke sound in the mind of the onlooker. Solo shows include The Mine Dubai, UAE, and group shows include Strange Cargo Gallery Folkestone, UK, The Art of Nuisance exhibition for Sisters of Perpetual Resistance London, Fashioning Frequencies at London College of Fashion, Gone With the Wind for ResonanceFM at Raven Row London, The Great Imagining at Gavin Turk studios, Unfolding Narratives at London College of Communication, Hosiery Snip Space to a Triangular Racing Lace at Outhouse Gallery, and The Shahnameh at Prince’s Galleries Shoreditch, London.
Installation and Video
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With a focus on materiality, Bradley uses electronics, found objects and textiles to create visual works that examine language, the act of memorising and perception within the context of place. Bradley had solo shows at “wednesday” gallery, London (previously Waterside Contemporary, now Verdurin), and The Mine, Dubai. Group shows include Fashioning Frequencies at London College of Fashion 2025, with the video instatallion PSA, 2025. In 2013 on a year’s residency with the leading body for sound art in UK ‘Sound and Music’ Bradley created 16mm film projector and reel to reel tape installation What Doesn’t Decay, treating home movies from 1970s Iran with crude oil, accompanied by an audio piece involving interviews about design in 1970’s US, UK and Iran. Other video commissions include for David Thorpe, MOCA London online and Platform Arts Projects, Folkestone.
Broadcast
Bradley performs live, improvised music and composes graphic scores for both solo performer and for ensembles as live radio broadcasts and conventional performances e.g. London Architecture Week, Conway Hall, Southbank Centre, for Non-Classical and as commissioned solo artist at for example the V&A Museum and South London Gallery.
Presenting and producing the weekly radio programme Six Pillars on West Asian, North African arts and culture Bradley broadcast on UK’s experimental arts-radio station Resonance104.4fm for 17 years. A vehicle and platform for a major research project into her place of birth, Six Pillars resulted in a considerable audio archive, a series of live events with Shubbak, London, for Amnesty International, podcasts from Jaou, Tunis for the Kamal Lazaar Foundation and much more. As Six Pillars, Bradley produced an international residency for Iranian creatives to visit the UK from Iran for IranUKSonics, studying with Master’s students on a bespoke programme produced by Bradley at UAL, and collaborating with the ResonanceFM collective, performing live on ResonanceFM and at Royal Festival Hall.
Bradley’s experimental dance music radio show Free Lab Radio, positioned the dancer as central to the selecting experience, investigating dance music as a listening, expressive, and collaborative culture outside of industry definition. The show ranged from guest mixes to interviews, and improvised group performances in the studio to live mixes by Bradley.
As part of her practice Bradley imagines pop-up radio arts projects, such as Falgoosh Radio at Art Dubai the largest art fair in the region, Jaou Tunis, Tunisia and at South London Gallery for Welcome to Iraq. In Welcome to Iraq (a tour of the Venice Biennial’s National Pavilion of Iraq), Bradley collaborated with local Iraqi playwright Hassan Abdulrazak, Iraqi poet Ghareeb Iskander and Iranian qanoonist Niloofar Habibian on a live stream from SLG to Resonance104.4FM. IN the art fairs, Bradley’s pop-up transmissions ran as broadcasts of interviews, panels, commissioned sound works with scores of guests such as Sophia al Maria, Jo Namy, and commissioned experimental sound art performances.
Radiophonic artwork solo commissions include a broadcast sound walk with an imagined, spoken-word narrative for MonaFoma 2018 at The Museum of Old and New Art, Tasmania, and the live radio performance Petrosubjectivity for Radio Revolten, Halle, Germany. Radiophonic works and research as interview broadcast live on air from the ResonanceFM booth at Frieze Art Fair 2006-2010 (interviews from the Zoo Art Fair amongst others), at the Serpentine Gallery for Ririkrit Tirivanija’s solo show, and UBS weekends at Tate Modern for Resonance104.4FM.
Talks
Academic papers and lecture-performances include Animal Utterances, Bristol University, Orpheus Institute, Ghent, London College of Communications, University of the Arts London e.g. the techne conference on Scenography at London College of Fashion: LOMA conference, Points of Listening at UAL, Unfolding Narratives at LCC, and guest lectures as a visiting lecturer at UAL, talks at Cambridge University for the Woman, Art, Freedom conference which she co-produced with artist Soheila Sokhanvari and Katy Shahendeh (SOAS) 2024. Bradley’s other lecture-performances include a live transmission on Suden Radio, at Villa Romana, Florence, at Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, The American University Dubai, Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture, Karachi, Habib University, Karachi and New York University Abu Dhabi, as well as on stage at Share Conference in its various guises: Belgrade, Beirut, Tunisia and Croatia.
Composer and Improviser
Artist in Residence
As duo Bradley-Weaver, residencies include the Lahore Biennial Foundation, in UAE: Maraya Arts Centre, Sharjah, Al Serkal Avenue, and Sharjah Art Foundation, Beirut Arts Centre, the International Symposium of Electronica Art at Sheikh Zayed University, UAE, and Malja Studios, Bahrain. Solo residencies include at NYU in Abu Dhabi, and as an Embedded Composer with by Sound and Music, UK’s leading body for sound art and composition, at n.o.where, London.
The Body As Listening Instrument – Djing
Never commercial, Bradley built on her experimental radio series Free Lab Radio on Resonance104.4FM, underground and SWANA dance music, with live sets in venues such as Corsica Studios, The National Portrait Gallery, V&A Museum and ICA London, festivals such as Glastonbury, Exit Festival, Serbia and Bestival, Isle of Wight. Bradley has played on moored boat installations e.g Venice Biennial for the Danish Pavilion, Emperor Tito’s repurposed ship, Croatia (Republika Festival), Radio Beirut, Lebanon, and art events such as Cafe Oto’s Daphne Oram Symposium, opening parties in the UAE for example Art Dubai and Sharjah Biennial, as well as and squat parties like. Area 21, Peckham.
On air Bradley has interviewed live on air huge numbers of artists and musicians such as: Charlie Dark, Cosey Fanni Tutti, Roddy Radiation, Acid Man, Mr Scruff, Egyptian Lover, Patrick Forge, Ceephax Acid Crew more.
Pedagogy as practice:
Teaching audio Journalism ( London Metropolitan University, Downview women’s prison, Westminster University, University of the Arts London, BBC Fast Train), and community radio at pop ups from Ukraine, to Columbia, to Tunisia.