Florian Grond is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Design and Computation Arts at Concordia University, where he is also Co-Director of the Centre for Sensory Studies. He is also a digital artist whose practice and research are rooted in immersive sound, sonification, auditory display, participatory design and accessibility. After completing a PhD in Germany (University of Bielefeld) and a postdoctoral fellowship in research-creation at McGill University, he developed expertise in the capture, mixing and diffusion of immersive sound.

His projects explore the creation of inclusive devices and experiences, in close dialogue with marginalised communities, particularly blind and neurodivergent people. He has initiated and led several artistic co-creation projects with artists with disabilities, and collaborated with researchers in sensory ethnography. With the late Belgian writer and researcher Piet Devos, he adapted the use of binaural technology as an innovative method for ethnographic research. His work is supported by the CALQ, the CAC, the FRQSC and the SSHRC, and spans the fields of sound arts, research-creation and sensory studies, with a view to developing new forms of listening and cultural mediation.

The Cummings & Pifko collective was born in 2019 from an installation that revealed the strength of their complementary worlds. For more than 25 years, Gaëtane Cummings, an artist with diverse abilities, has been transforming her experiences in a wheelchair into creativity and activism. Art, a space of freedom, leads her to explore performance, documentary, painting, installations, video, interventions and poetry. Sigmund Pifko, a multidisciplinary artist, illustrator, painter, graphic designer and enthusiast of digital arts and scenography, approaches each project as a research-creation, guided by sensitivity and curiosity. Together, they are part of the CripArt movement, which proposes to create and think about art differently while denouncing ableism. Their practice, nourished by the experience of marginalisation, seeks to transform exclusion into beauty, to reveal invisible realities and to open up new perspectives.

Through her experiences with authentic movement and somatic education, Anaëlle has honed her sensitivity to the interplay between symbolism, the body, and human thought, all of which fuel her writing. She is the author and designer of multidisciplinary collaborative projects that gather creators from diverse backgrounds. She is co-founder of the Elles fallait collective, which presents artistic performances at the intersection of culinary art and literature.

CiÖ is a Montreal-based collective comprising Ganesh Baron Aloir, Anaëlle Lacoste, Hamie Robitaille, oLivier Landry-Gagnon, and Alexandre Pariseau. Formed through a series of collaborations between Ganesh, Anaëlle, Hamie, and oLivier during artistic residencies (Maison de la culture Marie-Uguay, Plateau-Mont-Royal), the group crystallises a sensitive, immersive, and technological approach to mental health issues. Winner of a 2024 NUMIX Award in the Digital Art category for the CiÖ installation, the collective continues its research at the crossroads of interactive installation, sensory design, poetic narration and generative design.