Matadero Madrid presents the programme for the 7th edition of L.E.V. Matadero, which will take place from 18 to 21 September. The 2025 edition reaffirms its commitment to a programme of national and international artists who explore new languages and narratives born from the intersection of technology, music and performance. This year’s programme is built on the desire to offer a critical look at contemporary malaise. The festival brings together artistic proposals that explore diverse forms of cultural production to better understand our times. From pieces that address the climate crisis to creations that reflect on social precariousness, the impact of hyper-consumerism or the pathologisation of difference, the festival invites us to discover and reimagine our material reality through other possible worlds.
Sound session in Matadero Square
On Friday, 19 September, a new L.E.V Silent Sound Session will be presented in Matadero Square with two free performances by Mexican artist Fernando Corona, known as Murcof. These special sessions are characterised by listening through wireless headphones provided by the organisation. The artist will activate The Etna Sessions, a project born and built from field recordings in Etna Park, transformed with analogue and digital tools and modular synthesizers, giving rise to a soundscape that oscillates between drone, ambient, vaporous dub and minimalist techno with volcanic atmospheres. He will also present Twin Colour in the same session, a work that combines modular synthesis and studio experimentation, creating an immersive experience where the music produces a narrative that moves between melancholy and rhythmic force.
Live shows and audiovisual performances in Nave 10
The festival kicks off on Thursday, 18 September with Second Self, a hypnotic audiovisual performance created by Canadian artist Myriam Bleau and Taiwanese artist Nien Tzu Weng. That same night, the MP3 collective—Arnau Pérez, Pau Vegas, and Fernando Careaga—presents MP3 Live #1, a journey in which dance and electronic music merge in real time thanks to sensors that convert movement into sound.
Friday, 19 September begins with 321 Rule, a project by New York studio Team Rolfes accompanied by Lil Mariko, notable for their use of motion capture and live animation. Their work immerses the viewer in experiences that blur the line between the virtual and the physical. That same day, Carmen Jaci and Matthew Schoen will premiere an audiovisual performance that explores the connections between humans and digital data.
On Saturday 20 September, ARS NATURA, by Annabelle Playe and Hugo Arcier with Rima Ben Brahim, will transform Nave 10 into a space for contemplating natural landscapes and brutalist architecture as visions of the post-anthropocene. Also on display will be GREY LINE, by the Italian collective SPIME.IM, a sensory exploration of the colour grey as a metaphor for contemporary uncertainty.
To round off the event, on Sunday 21 September, Italian composer and producer Lorenzo Senni will present Canone Infinito Xtended, a constantly changing piece that reinvents the aesthetics of trance music to capture an ever-unfinished emotion. On the same day, Matthew Biederman and Alain Thibault will offer Incertitude, a dialogue between algorithmic image and synthetic sound that explores the tension between control and chance.
Vortex: new virtual worlds at L.E.V. Matadero
The Vortex section is once again focusing on long-term virtual, mixed and interactive reality projects that invite visitors to immerse themselves completely in digital universes and discover the artistic potential of these technologies. The experiences can be enjoyed in Nave 0, Central de Diseño and Taller.
Among the proposals, Noire stands out, an immersive augmented reality experience produced by Stéphane Foenkinos and Pierre Alain Giraud based on the text by Tania de Montaigne. Created by the Novaya studio, it transports the viewer to the era of racial segregation in the southern United States, inviting them to inhabit the memory of Claudette Colvin and reflect on her invisible history.
Also coming to this space is IMPULSE: PLAYING WITH REALITY, by May Abdalla and Barry Gene Murphy, which explores the perception of the world from the perspective of people with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).
French artist Adelin Schweitzer presents The Sutherland Test, a performance that questions the relationship between technology and human perception through an intense and uncomfortable experience.
Carles Castaño Oliveiros proposes *2025/…, a mixed reality installation produced by Servicios Inmersivos that combines political narrative and a dystopian environment to reflect, with irony and harshness, the contradictions of hyper-consumerist society.
The section also includes Rick Treweek’s Uncanny Alley, an acclaimed VRChat experience that takes audiences to the most enigmatic corners of the metaverse.
Augmented city
In the augmented reality experience programme, Fortune Teller, by French artist Julie Stephen Chheng, invites participants to discover spirits associated with natural elements hidden in space. Locatable via a free app, these spirits reveal desires, fears and worldviews, creating a poetic encounter that connects nature, technology and thought.
Audiovisual installations circuit
In the Plató room at Cineteca Matadero, artist Theo Triantafyllidis presents Drift Lattice, an immersive simulation of a marine ecosystem where aquatic life coexists with synthetic waste. The work reacts in real time to global climatic and ecological data, functioning as a speculative barometer of human impact on the oceans. In Nave Una, LP Rondeau presents Liminal, an interactive installation that symbolises the threshold between past and present. A 2.75-metre ring captures the silhouette of those who pass through it in black and white and projects it in a distorted form, evoking the unstoppable passage of time.
Tickets now on sale at www.levfestival.com and www.mataderomadrid.org.
Sigue toda la información de HIGHXTAR desde Facebook, Twitter o Instagram