Dr Duncan Speakman
- Tutor (Research)
- Digital Narrative Arts MA/MFA
- Senior Tutor (Research)
- Communication MFA
Duncan is an artist and composer. He works on narrative experiences in uncontrolled environments and the role of sound in futures studies.
Duncan creates narrative experiences that engage audiences emotionally and physically in uncontrolled spaces. From intimate in-ear stories to large scale performances, his award winning projects range from augmented reality walks and hybrid print/digital projects, to sound installations on tram networks and loudspeaker symphonies.
His current research is focused on the role of sound in futures thinking. He is co-director of Future Places Toolkit Ltd whose mission is to engage everyone in the shaping the future of their places using immersive technology.
Key details
School, Centre or Area
More information
Research interests
Duncan’s primary research interests are the temporal structure of augmented reality experiences and the role of sound in futures studies.
Practice
Duncan Speakman is long term resident of the Pervasive Media Studio in Bristol. He is best known for creating sonic experiences that engage audiences in uncontrolled public and private space, including installations on trains in Guangzhou, loudspeaker symphonies in Christchurch, audio walks in Saitama, and sound installations in Porto; radio pieces for Radio 4, augmented reality theatre in Eindhoven and he has also recently developed a number of hybrid print/digital experiments.
From 2010-2015 he was co-director of the artists collective circumstance with Sarah Anderson, Emilie Grenier and Tom Abba.
His recent audio augmented reality project ‘Only Expansion’ won Best Immersive/XR experience at London Film Festival and the Special Jury award for Immersive Non-fiction at International Documentary Festival Amsterdam.
In 2021 he completed his PhD Composing Entanglement - Temporal Structure of Audio Augmented Reality".
From 2022-2024 he lead the MA Immersive Storytelling at Royal Holloway London and the MA Virtual and Extended Realities at UWE Bristol.
He was recently a senior researcher at University of Bristol working on the immersive audio performances as a tool for participatory speculative design.
He currently tutors on the MA in Digital Direction at the Royal College of Arts, London. He has also delivered keynotes and papers at MIT Open Documentary Lab, International Documentary Festival Amsterdam, Royal Geographic Society, SXSW, Antwerp Research Institute, Het Nieuwe Instituut Rotterdam, Design Institute Hong Kong, and more.
Awards
- 2021 - Best Immersive and XR Award, London Film Festival
- 2019 - Special Jury Award for Immersive Non-Fiction, International Documentary Festival, Amsterdam
- 2017 - Jury Selection, International Documentary Festival, Amsterdam
- 2017 - Digital Dozen:Breakthroughs in Storytelling Award, Columbia University
- 2016 - Total Stage Awards, Best Physical Theatre/Dance Edinburgh Festival
- 2009 - Vauxhall Collective, Innovation in Theatre, London
Publications, exhibitions and other outcomes
Publications
- 2020 - Listening to Circumstance: (in conversation with Klare Lason)
- in The Routledge Companion to Mobile Media Art
- 2020 - It Must Have Been Dark By Then (in conversation with Kate Pullinger)
- in Ambient Literature: Towards a New Poetics of Situated Writing and Reading Practices
- 2018 - Anthropocene Elegy and Geospatial Presence - Media Theory, Vol 2
- 2016 - ’A Folded Path’, What Urban Media Art Can Do (AVeditions)
- 2013 - ‘The Audience Becomes the Orchestra’ - Visualise - Making Art in Context (Cambridge)
- 2003 - Design of Cafe Based Digital Experience - Personal and Ubiquitous Computing 07/2003
Exhibitions
- 2025 - Undershed, Bristol
- 2024 - Wales Millenium Centre, Cardiff
- 2020 - Sonic Acts, Amsterdam
- 2021 - Baltic, Gateshead
- 2021 - Bluecoat, Liverpool
- 2019 - IDFA Amsterdam
- 2019 - STRP Eindhoven
- 2019 - Oxford International Science Festival
- 2018 - OpenCityDocs, London
- 2018 - True/False Documentary Festival, Columbia
- 2017 - ScreenCity, Bergen
- 2016 - Saitama Triennial, Tokyo
- 2015 - Times Museum, Guangzhou
- 2014 - Audacious Sonic Arts Festival, Christchurch
- 2013 - Serravles Em Festa, Porto
- 2012 - Open City, Guimaraes
- 2012 - MOCA, Taipei
- 2012 - Electrified III / Trak, Gent
- 2012 - Playpublik, Berlin
- 2011 - Kontraste Festival, Krems
- 2011 - Yokohama Triennial
- 2011 - Edinburgh International Film Fesitval
- 2010 - Media City, Seoul
- 2010 - Microwave, Hong Kong