Radio Art

Radio art refers to the use of radio for art.

The artist who works in Radio Art is not necessarily a trained DJ, programmer, producer, or engineer, but one who uses sound to make art. The radio medium can be used in ways which are different than what it was intended for.

In that sense, the way the message is transmitted and received by an audience is as important as the message itself. "As an aural art form it reaffirms that it's not just what we say, but the way we say it." In Victoria Fenner's words, "Radio art is art which is specifically composed for the medium of radio and is uniquely suited to be transmitted via the airwaves."

Artists use radio technology (i.e. radio transmission, airwaves...) to communicate artistic compositions for interpretation – exposing their audience to alternate means to experiencing their art through sound verses visualization. Radio Art contributes to new media art - a digitally driven art movement growing in response to the informative technological revolution we live in. “From the artist's point of view radio is an environment to be entered into and acted upon, a site for various cultural voices to meet, converse, and merge in. These artists cross disciplines, raid all genres and recontextualize them into hybrids.”

Radio Art projects can be collaborative including various professional sources, unifying an audio broadcast with science, experimentation, geography, entertainment, etc." Some have approached radio as an architectural space to be constructed sonically and linguistically; or as the site of an event, an arena, or stage. Some used it as a gathering place, or a conduit, a means to create community. Other artists have employed the media landscape itself as the narrative, while others looked into the body as the site and the source; the voicebox, the larynx become medium and metaphor."