Head of the Department Sound Art Composition

Born 1961 in Aachen, composer and sound artist. Studied composition (with Herbert Nobis) and instrumental music (classical percussion) at the MH Cologne as well as musicology, theatre studies and philosophy at the University of Cologne. Diploma artistic degree and diploma instrumental pedagogue. Further studies with Luigi Nono, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Luciano Berio, Brian Ferneyhough, Herbert Brün. Film music composition with Michael Nyman and experimental music theatre with Vic Hoyland.

1992-2004 lecturer at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne (2000-2004 as Professor and Director >MusicDept.<) and since 2001 Professor of New Music/New Media at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, (then FB11 Hochschule für Musik und Akademie für bildende Künste), today Hochschule für Musik Mainz. Head of the Sound Art Composition Department there since 2010

Since 1984 compositions and music performances (WDR productions), music for film, television, video, ballet and theatre in Germany and abroad as well as experimental compositions for electronics, chamber music, orchestra and the Studio Acoustic Art of WDR. As a sound artist, projects at international festivals including Akademie der Künste Berlin, Soundart Hannover, Bauhütte Klangzeit, Wuppertal, Fabbrica Europa, Florence.

His compositions for instruments and electronics always focus on space. His projects include Ex Maccina (with Fabbrizio Plessi) at the Venice Biennale and the film score La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc at Notre Dame Cathedral in Luxembourg. In his orchestral work from 2016 gemeinsam... / - not with me! he used a 5-channel spatial reproduction with sounds from 76 years of German history, which was specially adapted to the interior of the chamber music hall of the Berlin Philharmonie, which was designed for spatial music.

Exhibitions of his work as a sound artist have been presented by the Akademie der Künste in Berlin, Brückenmusik X in Cologne, Soundart in Hanover and Bauhütte Klangzeit in Wuppertal.

He is a curator and consultant to museums in Germany, France, Belgium, Finland, Luxembourg and Switzerland and was artistic director of the ‘Klangraum-Raumklang 2004’ festival in Cologne.

His book ‘Klangräume der Kunst’ on the aspects of space in sound art was published by Kehrer-Verlag in May 2010.

From 2018 to 2024, Peter Kiefer is head of the ARS Art - Research - Sound project (https://ars.uni-mainz.de/) funded by the Gutenberg Research College of the Johannes Gutenberg University with the project components CUPRAS Cultural Practice of Sound in the context of Sound Art and Sound Research. In this context, he was also artistic director of the GUSAC Gutenberg Sound Art Academy festival in Mainz in 2019.

In this context, the publication ‘Exhibiting SoundArt’ ed. Peter Kiefer, Michael Zwenzner was published by Wolke Verlag. https://www.wolke-verlag.de/musikbuecher/peter-kiefer-michael-zwenzner-exhibiting-soundart/ English, 248 p., 150 photos, pb, € 29.80, 978-3-95593-098-1

In 2019, Kiefer was elected as a full member of the Academy of Sciences and Literature Mainz.