Physioactive Listening in the Auditory Landscape

This paper introduces and examines the concept of physioactive listening (PL), an embodied form of auditory engagement involving physical movement while exploring soundscapes and audio installations. Distinct from traditional physiopassive listening common in concert halls, PL emerges from experimental practices, including Happenings, soundwalking, and contemporary immersive audio environments. The paper traces PL's emergence through early non-technological approaches and later technology-dependent implementations, with particular focus on work undertaken at IEM (Institute for Electronic Music and Acoustics, Graz). Building on theories of embodied cognition and enactive perception, PL emphasises the relationship between sound, body, and space. The concept has several creative and technological implications: it contrasts single-point listening to pluriformal sonic experience, highlights the importance of interaction with aural architecture, and necessitates non-teleological structures. The outcome is hybrid practice combining elements of composition, installation, and soundscape. The paper argues that PL facilitates a more perceptually integrated experience of sound than is found in traditional listening contexts and compositional practices.