Medea(s) – Tskaltubo is Eve Aboulkheir’s speculative sonic study of the Medea sanatorium, completed in 1962, in Tskaltubo, a spa town in Georgia that was abandoned after the Soviet collapse. For Aboulkheir, Medea is a place of ambiguity: monumental architecture gradually overtaken by nature, suspended between care and neglect. Even its name resonates, recalling the ambivalence of the mythic Medea—between healing and poison, order and drift—that mirrors the building’s condition today. Her new work draws on recordings she made inside the vacant building, later transformed on a modular synthesizer, together with ARP 2500 sounds recorded during a residency at INA GRM in Paris. For the performance at the Graham Foundation—which marks her debut in the United States—Aboulkheir arranges these materials into open structures, using spatialization, reverb, and filtering to shape them in real time.

Founded on bubbling hot springs, Tskaltubo once welcomed hundreds of thousands of Soviet citizens on state-prescribed holidays every year. Workers arrived with government-issued vouchers for rest and treatment, while members of the political elite came to enjoy the same mineral waters. Among its many sanatoriums was Medea, an imposing classical structure whose colonnades and blue archways embodied the ideals of health and prosperity. After the Soviet collapse, the complex was abandoned and later became a refuge for people displaced by the war in Abkhazia, leaving it caught between grandeur and ruin.

Reflecting on her visit to Tskaltubo in April 2025, Aboulkheir noted, “I approached Medea as a succession of listening points. The distant croaking of frogs, heard from inside, overlapped with the creaking of doors… the same frogs, heard up close by the pond, now mingled with air currents through the colonnades and the slamming of doors on the upper floors.” For the French composer, Medea is a place of ambiguity: monumental architecture gradually overtaken by nature, suspended between care and neglect. Even its name resonates, recalling the ambivalence of the mythic Medea—between healing and poison, order and drift—that mirrors the building’s condition today.

Eve Aboulkheir (b.1991, Paris, France) is a sound artist and composer based in Paris. She uses field recordings gathered in specific sites, blending them with synthetic textures. Her work often begins from lived experiences of perceptual disturbance—moments when sensory input falters and the world seems to slip. Her compositions emerge from that instability, inviting listeners into in-between zones where meaning destabilizes. She has performed at CTM Festival, Berlin; MaerzMusik, Berlin; Sonic Acts, Amsterdam; Out.Fest, Barreiro; and Elevate, Graz, among others. Her projects include Venus Road, inspired by a nocturnal journey through Singapore’s MacRitchie Reservoir, where forest sounds seemed to sync with the pulse of the city. Releases include Hypnagogic Walks (KRAAK, 2023) and 22/12/2017 Guilin Synthetic Daydream on GRM Portraits (Shelter Press, 2023, split with Lasse Marhaug), a piece first presented on the GRM Acousmonium. Aboulkheir studied at Villa Arson in Nice.

Artist Talk: Eve Aboulkheir discusses Medea(s) – Tskaltubo, revisiting her time at the abandoned Medea sanatorium and how that experience informed the work. She shows photographs and plays recordings made there, then reveals how she modifies those sounds in the studio. For her, it’s change—not documentation—that conveys the presence of a place. The acoustics of architecture become the architectures of memory. Lampo Annex, Monadnock Building, 53 W. Jackson Blvd #1656. Thursday, December 4, 6 p.m RSVP

Since 2010, the Graham Foundation has partnered with Lampo to produce an international performance series held at the Madlener House. Lampo has partnered with the Chicago Architecture Biennial since 2015, contributing performances and programs across multiple editions.

Lampo, established in 1997, supports artists working in new music, experimental sound, and other interdisciplinary practices. Rather than making programming decisions around tour schedules, Lampo invites selected artists to create and perform new work, and then the organization provides the space, resources, and curatorial support to help them fulfill their vision. Lampo also organizes artist talks, lectures, screenings, and workshops, and publishes written and recorded documents related to its series.

Additional support provided by Villa Albertine Chicago, the French Institute for Culture and Education

Cellist Leila Bordreuil and guitarist Lee Ranaldo present Constellations, a new longform work that introduces structure to their earlier free improvisations. The duo explores a more defined sound—one that seems to expand endlessly, even as it circles back to begin again.

Lee Ranaldo (b.1956, Glen Cove, N.Y.), musician, visual artist, and writer, co-founded Sonic Youth in 1981. He played in Glenn Branca’s early ensembles and symphonies, 1980–1984, and has been active both in New York and internationally for over forty years as a composer, performer, collaborator, and producer, also exhibiting visual art at galleries and museums worldwide, and publishing several books of journals, poetry, and writings on music. His 30-year performance partnership with Leah Singer, currently Contre Jour, have been large scale, multi-projection sound and light events with suspended electric guitar phenomena that challenge the usual performer/audience relationship. He lives in New York City.

Leila Bordreuil (b.1990, Brooklyn, N.Y.) is a Brooklyn-based cellist, composer, and improviser from Aix-en-Provence, France. Her cello playing focuses on the inherent sonic qualities of her instrument, paying careful attention to timbre and texture. Through extended techniques, unorthodox amplification, and sound-spatialization, Bordreuil explores both the possibilities of the cello and the body’s experience of sound in space.

Her collaborative projects are numerous and diverse, including work with Lee Ranaldo, Luke Stewart, Bill Nace, Tamio Shiraishi, Bookworms, Zach Rowden, Kali Malone, and Laurel Halo.

She has performed at the Whitney Museum, MoMA PS1, The Kitchen, The Stone, Issue Project Room, Lincoln Center, Roulette, and Pioneer Works, New York; Café Oto, London; All Ears Festival, Oslo; Ausland, Berlin; Ftarri, Tokyo; Le Guess Who?, Utrecht; KRAAK Festival, Brussels; Sound of Stockholm Festival, Stockholm; BRDCST Festival, Brussels; Control Club, Bucharest; and the Heresy Series for Women in Sound, Manila.

She was a 2021 Jerome Foundation Artist Fellow and an Artist-in-Residence at INA GRM, Paris. Other residencies include EMS, Stockholm (2019); Exploring the Metropolis, New York, N.Y. (2019); Les Brasseries Atlas, Brussels (2018); MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, N.H. (2017); Issue Project Room, Brooklyn, N.Y. (2016); and the Atlantic Center for the Arts, New Smyrna Beach, Fla. (2013).

Leila Bordreuil appeared with Lampo in March 2018, her first performance in Chicago.

Lampo, established in 1997, supports artists working in new music, experimental sound, and other interdisciplinary practices. The Chicago-based organization's core activity has been and remains its performance series. Rather than making programming decisions around tour schedules, Lampo invites selected artists to create and perform new work, and then the organization provides the space, resources, and curatorial support to help them fulfill their vision. Lampo also organizes artist talks, lectures, screenings, and workshops, and publishes written and recorded documents related to its series.

Photo: Reuben Radding

Accessibility: This event will be held in the ballroom on the third floor of the Madlener House, which is only accessible by stairs. The first-floor galleries and bookshop are accessible via outdoor lift. Please contact us at 312.787.4071 or info@grahamfoundation.org to make arrangements.

Note: Registration for Lampo programs is required, but does not guarantee entry. Capacity for this performance is limited. Doors open 20 minutes prior to the performance and seats are available on a first-come, first-serve basis for those registered in advance. Reservations expire 5 minutes before the performance start time, at which point seating will be released to the waitlist. Due to the popularity of the Lampo programs, performances quickly reach capacity. No late seating will be permitted.