Handwerke Live Sessions & NFT Drop

2022 | Live Video & NFT | Live-Music and Composition

BUY THE NFT ON OPENSEA

I recorded a version of Miles Davis’ »Nardis« in the »Handwerk« recording sessions in 2015. We released it as a single in May ’22. I decided to record a live video alongside it, since I was working on the live set anyway. In relation to the single release, we have dropped 10 individual 15-25 seconds video loops, based on the backprojection-videos on May 26 on OpenSea. NFT owners receive a random vinyl record from Lovermann’s debut release “Handwerke”. The audio-loops are taken from the live recording. I have been experimenting with NFTs with Der Greif, the organization for contemporary photography I founded and run as artistic director.

I also recorded four tracks from my debut album »Handwerke«. All five recordings are available as live videos. DOP André Döbert who shot and edited the videos has worked with the concept of loops in his visuals as well. The camera constantly moves around me while I performs on stage.
To create atmosphere and distinction between the different recordings, André and myself have developed 5 abstract video loops that are projected during the performance. They also visualize circles, loops and quote Lovermann’s approach to creating his music: Simple, but strong repetitive patterns.

The release is a collaboration of Der Greif and Squama Recordings. Artwork designed by Daily Dialogue.

DOP & Edit: André Doebert, Munich
Recording: Chris Stoeger, Munich
Edit: Simon Lovermann, Munich
Mixing & Mastering: Sam Irl, Vienna

Handwerke – Songs for my Fathers

2021 | Album | Live-Music and Composition

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»Handwerke – Songs for My Fathers« is Simon Lovermann’s debut album. Oscillating between Jazz, Electronica, Hip Hop and Minimal Music, the album is focused around the piano, both as a harmonic and a percussive instrument. Simon’s biological father, Robert, was a Jazz musician and died before his birth. Simon was raised by his father Christian. The album is therefore a vividly emotional way for him to explore topics like death, fatherhood, family, identity and belonging. (continued below)

The story is told using audio-samples taken from the Wim Wenders movie »Paris, Texas«, which are positioned as a loose story line in between the songs. This layer is the first connection to the visual – to film in particular – which is then expanded through accompanying images and video-works.

For the vinyl version of the album, Simon invited 16 artists to contribute an image that reflects their own personal (artistic) identity, with the intention of bringing together a variety of different, deeply individual explorations of the self. „Handwerke“ comes with a special artwork and cover design, featuring these contributions printed on individual postcards and assembled in a 20-page booklet.

Contributing artists:

• Laia Abril
• Thomas Albdorf
• Gita Cooper-van Ingen
• Adji Dieye
• Anna Ehrenstein
• Saskia Groneberg
• Balarama Heller
• Tommy Kha
• Gabby Laurent
• Fiona Ones
• Nicolas Polli
• Maximilian Prüfer
• Silvia Rosi
• Pacifico Silano
• Susanne Steinmaßl
• Dustin Thierry

The videos are collaborations with choreographer Dustin Klein and visual artist Maximilian Prüfer. They also reflect on notions of identity and the construction of the self.

Simon celebrated the release with an intimate suite of performances at WEBBER Gallery in London, showcasing all 16 visual contributions.

The release is a collaboration of Der Greif and Squama Recordings. Artwork designed by Daily Dialogue.

Recording: Michael Kamm, Lovebox Studios, Pas de Deux, Augsburg
Edit: Karim Weth, Simon Lovermann, The Grand Post, Vienna
Mixing: Sam Irl, Vienna

Der Greif #14: YES TO ALL (with Sylvie Fleury)

Buy Der Greif Issue 14 by Sylvie Fleury

As guest editor of issue 14 of Der Greif, Sylvie Fleury suggested to use YES TO ALL as the theme.

“I chose YES TO ALL as the theme for this issue as a gesture towards freedom and openness after recent restrictions and limitations. From early on in the process, I wanted to bring in a spirit of permissiveness. Looking at the submissions with a strict selection of “yes” and “no” did not feel right. Instead, I used a pendulum to select and create image combinations.” – Sylvie Fleury

Originating as a computer command, YES TO ALL is a recurring theme in Fleury’s oeuvre.

Die Stühle – The Chairs

2020 | Dancetheatre | Live-Music and Composition

We created an adaptation of Ionesco’s famous play for Origen Festival. I wrote miniatures for piano solo.

“As the world is incomprehensible to me, I am waiting for someone to explain it.” Eugene Ionesco.

The couple in Eugene Ionesco’s 1952 play ‘The Chairs’, live in a circular room in a tower in the middle of a circular island surrounded by nothing but stagnant sea. They are isolated from the world and also from each other.

“Let’s amuse ourselves by making believe”.

Preparing for a big announcement to be made which will affect the future mankind, the couple greet imaginary guests and reminisce about past times but ultimately the empty chairs and invisible crowd become a metaphor for the reality of unreality.

In this seminal example of the Theatre of the Absurd genre; time, place and identity are ambiguous and fluid. The futility and loneliness of the human condition is highlighted, perhaps suggesting that the only way to bring meaning to our time on earth is to decide for ourselves what is meaningful

Choreography: Dustin Klein
Composition and live music: Simon Lovermann
Actor Felix von Bredow
Costumes: Louise Flanagan
Dancers (from Pina Bausch Company): Nicholas Losada, Réginald Lefebvre

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

2021 | Dancetheatre | Composition and Music Production

I wrote and performed the music for choreographer Dustin Klein’s adaptation of the famous novel and movie “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”. We were commissioned by the opera in Pilsen to produce the piece. The image of the American society, where unyielding conventions exclude any individuality and expressions of own will, fascinated Dustin to freely transcribe the famous work into a dance format. I approached writing the score for the piece by using different elements that I found to be key in creating the atmosphere for the movie – for example keychains, sounds of basketball courts, metal fences, card games… I recorded these elements and used samples as foundations for the rhythmic structure of the score.

Dustin based his adaptation on experiences gained during his previous activities for the Stuttgart and Munich Ballet, or the Moscow Stanislaus Theater. The intimacy of the small scene allowed us to deepen the psychological picture of each character and touch the moral essence of the famous novel.

Choreography: Dustin Klein
Composition and music production: Simon Lovermann
Voice and text: Felix von Bredow
Costumes: Louise Flanagan
with dancers from Opera Pilsen, Premiere – 29th May 2021 Divadlo J.K.Tyla Pilsen, Czech Republic

Der Greif #13: Surplus Management (with Penelope Umbrico)

2020 | Print Publication, Virtual Performance

Buy Der Greif Issue 13 by Penelope Umbrico

As guest editor of issue 13 of Der Greif, Penelope Umbrico launched an open call for images of surplus. Requesting images that could be combined with others, she strung them together to create a
new space within these pages. Here multiple individual images have become one collective space: global points of local views are localized into a singular global view. Umbrico sequences these images to create an underlying narrative around order and disorder that registers our human relationship to the objects we make.

Each image is numbered in order of appearance in the sequence, but the pages are intentionally unbound, allowing them to easily become out of order upon viewing. The issue is printed on surplus paper found at the printer. We invite owners of the book to create their own order of the unbound spreads and upload them to a specific archive on our website.

For the launch event, we asked artists, curators and critics to contribute their own version of the issue. We brought all contributors together in a virtual launch event to present the issue and the contributions.

Psychomachia

2020 | Dancetheatre | Live-Music and Composition

Of the arbitrariness of happiness. I wrote and performed the music for “Psychomachia”, the newest creation fromDustin Klein, choreographer and soloist at Bavarian State Ballet for Origen Festival in Switzerland. Dustin and the dancers of the Bavarian State Ballet deal with the duel of virtue and vice, the whims of fortune, symbolised in the medieval wheel of fortune.

superbia vs. humilitas, idolatria vs. fides, ira vs. paciencia, luxuria vs. temperantia. In Herrad from Landsberg’s 12th century illuminated manuscript Hortus Deliciarum, the Psychomachia illustrations depict the battles between the female vices and virtues. Overseeing these battles is the game show host Fortuna, deciding who will rise and who will fall by spinning the wheel of fortune.

Choreography: Dustin Klein
Composition and live music: Simon Lovermann
Voice and text: Felix von Bredow
Costumes: Louise Flanagan
Dancers (Soloists of the Bavarian State Ballet): Henry Grey, Kristina Lind, Elvina Ibraimova, Maria Chiara Bono, Carollina de Souza Bastos

Der Greif #12: Blame The Algorithm (with Broomberg & Chanarin)

2019 | Print Publication, Exhibition, Display, Performance | Kunstinsel am Lenbachplatz, Stadtmuseum, Lothringer 13, Munich

Buy Der Greif Issue 12 by Broomberg & Chanarin

As guest editors of issue 12 of DER GREIF, Broomberg and Chanarin sent out a call for images that are too private, too quiet, too violent, too political, too subversive or too explicit to share online. They received an avalanche of submissions. Faced with a daunting task of editing the material they turned to a disgruntled former facebook employee who will remain anonymous. Broomberg and Chanarin decided to include both the GOOD and the BAD.

Issue 12 challenges our way of looking at and perceiving images. It asks if and how we may all be complicit to an ongoing commodification of imagery by using social media. Featuring the work of 85 photographers and artists, as well as excerpts from a four-hour interview with a former Facebook content moderator, conducted by Broomberg & Chanarin.

We were invited by the city of Munich to expand the concept of the issue. We presented a display of GOOD and BAD at Lenbachplatz in the heart of the city. For Munich Stadtmuseum, we created an installation of all corresponding magazine spreads of both the GOOD and the BAD sequence of images. Visitors were invited to leave their mark and make their own decisions: Is this image GOOD or BAD? Because of the explicit nature of some of the published images, the visitors also had to make a decision if they wanted to reveal the content or rather leave it censored.

During Fotodoks, we hosted an Oxford-style debate at Lothringer 13 during Fotodoks Munich, discussing the pros and cons of (image-) censorship online.

The debate took the form of presentations between 2-4 minutes per person. One team arguing FOR and the other one AGAINST censorship online. The GOOD team argued for a healthy amount of censorship, as the web is a safe, unregulated space for everyone to express/share/question/surf. The BAD team argued against a healthy amount of censorship needed online to protect readers.

Eden

2019 | Dancetheatre | Live-Music and Composition

I got invited by long time friend, collaborator and choreographer Dustin Klein to compose the score for his work “Eden”, commissioned by Origen Festival Cultural. “Eden” explores the subject of the sin. Contemplating the relationship between the original sin in the garden of Eden and subsequent situations in which mankind has been confronted with since the beginning of time, how have we learnt to deal with temptation? Have we even learnt at all? Are we worthy of paradise?

The piece premiered in the Julier-tower, one of the most spectacular theatre venues: A red, round, 37 meters tall tower on the Julier pass on top of 2.300m altitude, with a round stage that is suspended from the ceiling. The audience is sitting all around the stage which creates a very special atmosphere. Anne Gryczka documented the entire process, from conception to adapting it to the space.

Choreography: Dustin Klein
Composition and live music: Simon Lovermann
Dancers (Soloists of the Bavarian State Ballet): Robin Strona, Kristina Lind, Henry Grey, Antonia McAuley
Costumes: Louise Flanagan
Graphic Design: Paul Putzar

Dancing in Peckham

2019 | Performances and exhibition | Collaboration with Webber Gallery & Photoworks | Peckham 24, London | May 17 till 19

Dance is a universal language of expression. We dance alone, in the privacy of our own homes; we dance together, in pairs and in groups, forming communities based on shared likes and experiences. Dancing in Peckham during Peckham 24 explored the intersection between dance, music and movement through contemporary photography, performance and video, celebrating how these freedoms of expression helped define different communities.
Peckham 24 is a short festival of contemporary photography that takes place during Photo London week across warehouses, galleries and art spaces in one of London’s most exciting and dynamic artistic quarters. In the spirit of this year’s theme “Collaboration x Community”, Photoworks, Der Greif and Webber Gallery shared a space to explore different perspectives on a common theme, Dancing in Peckham.
The three days of photography, performance and music included live performances on Friday evening and Saturday during the day.

Works from the following artists curated by Photoworks & Guest Curator Jamila Prowse: Lotte Andersen, Marie Barrett, Amar Ediriwira, Bernice Mulenga, Lilian Nejatpour & Rebecca Salvadori

Works from the following artists curated by Webber Gallery: Mel Bles, Marton Perlaki & Dorottya Vekony, Senta Simond

Performances from the following artists curated by Der Greif: Alexandra Davenport, Simone Mudde & Lana Mesic, Dustin Ericksen