Put on a pair. Step inside the artwork: OLLO Audio at Pixxelpoint 2026
At Pixxelpoint 2026, listening was part of the artwork. Visitors could play records, shape sounds and explore interactive installations, with OLLO headphones connecting them to what the artists had created.
We supported the festival close to home in Nova Gorica, Slovenia, and visited to experience it ourselves. Here’s a look inside SONONIMI, this year’s edition curated by Andrej Kobal.
SONONIMI: Liminal Spaces of Sound and Image
Pixxelpoint is the International Festival of Contemporary Art Practices, connecting Nova Gorica and Gorizia. Its 27th edition ran from 16 to 23 October 2026, exploring the relationships between sound and image.
Curator Andrej Kobal, a Slovenian composer, sound artist and audiovisual systems developer, brought together Slovenian and international artists working with sound, performance, kinetic structures, algorithmic processes and spatial installations.
Many of the works invited visitors to participate. Touch a control. Play a record. Hear how a sound changes. Spending time with each installation became part of discovering it.
Inside SONONIMI with curator Andrej Kobal, Pixxelpoint 2026.
From the creative process to the gallery
With multiple sound installations sharing a gallery, headphones gave visitors a way to focus on individual works. Andrej explained their role as he walked us through the exhibition:
“This year the festival is based on sound. We have a lot of sound installations that are interactive with the public, and we use a lot of different devices. One of the main and most important ones is the OLLO headphones. They are not just very useful in the creative process, and a lot of artists actually use them. They are also useful when people come to the gallery. Because there are a lot of sounds, we tend to put them into the headphones. OLLO headphones fit very well with that because they are really nice-looking, and that first impression matters, since this is also a visual festival. But the sound quality is also amazing, so it’s a nice combination.”
Individual listening. A shared experience.
At the heart of the exhibition was the SONONIMI site-specific installation. Material from different artists was recorded onto records. Visitors could play them on four turntables, listen on OLLO headphones and build their own combinations of sound.
“The fun thing is that we can also use them together,” Andrej explains. “Different users each have a pair of headphones, one user and another user, so they can combine and listen to different installations together and have this immersive and collective experience.”
The SONONIMI turntable installation.
Sounds shaped by the visitors
Clockwork Voltage, a Slovenian community of modular synthesizer enthusiasts, presented SONONIMI Modular. The hands-on installation invited visitors to interact with the system and listen to the results on OLLO headphones.
In Tomaž Grom’s Imstrument, recordings by artists from across Europe became material for visitors to combine into new compositions. Four pairs of OLLO headphones allowed them to listen together as they explored the work.
Part of the artwork
For Andrej, the headphones took on another role in the exhibition:
“All of us as sound artists use headphones. We use OLLO in our creative process, but here they changed their format a bit, because now they are part of the installations. They are so nice-looking that they are also like a piece of art.”
We love audio communities. At Pixxelpoint, we could hear and see what that support made possible: artists sharing their work, visitors experimenting with sound, and people listening together.
For us, it was a chance to experience our headphones from another perspective. The same tools artists use to create became part of how visitors discovered their work.
About Pixxelpoint
Pixxelpoint is the International Festival of Contemporary Art Practices, a cross-border project connecting Nova Gorica, Slovenia, and Gorizia, Italy. Alongside its exhibitions, the festival features performances, lectures, concerts, guided tours and workshops for schools and university students.
Explore the community: Pixxelpoint Festival · Andrej Kobal · Clockwork Voltage
