shanti suki osman

Shanti Suki Osman

Shanti Suki Osman is a Berlin based sound artist who works with song sound and radio, exploring the ideas of identity, privilege, anti racism and feminism. Shanti began in sound art through her electro feminist pop duo ‘Late Nights In Squat Bars’ and then continuing her activist work into podcasts and other performance pieces. She is also a research associate at the institute of musicology and media studies at the Humboldt university with her work focusing on women of colour, sound and space making.

Here are a few pieces of Shanti’s work which she shared and talked to us about. I will be describing the aim and process behind each piece and offering my own critical response. 

Hidden stories

Hidden stories is a radio show which tells musical narratives with post-colonial sounds and songs. The stories revolve around lesser know people, objects and events that have occurred in art, music and political history.

I listened to the Hidden story: Nakba which was a 30 minute segment about the sociopolitical issues that Palestinians have faced historically and today. The piece combines a narrative, music and ambiences to give an immersive experience to listeners and help them to understand the depth of the story.

I enjoyed listening to this segment and the range of ambience, narrative and music created an immersive experience which gave some insight into Palestinian history which I otherwise wouldn’t of know. This is an impressive piece of radio work however I found it hard to follow at times due to the depth of history and my lack of knowledge around the subject.