Bio
Agata Zemla (b. 1994, Rybnik) is a composer, performer, and sound artist whose work blends contemporary and electroacoustic music with scientific research—particularly in the fields of biology, ecology, and psychoacoustics. Her practice is interdisciplinary and research-based, forming an artistic response to urgent ecological and sociopolitical challenges. Her work is often described as socially engaged art, rooted in a deep reflection on the state of the world and the human relationship with the environment.
In 2024, she graduated with distinction in composition from the Karol Lipiński Academy of Music in Wrocław, where she studied under Professor PhD Cezary Duchnowski, and completed her bachelor’s degree in music theory under PhD Aleksandra Pijarowska. Her academic research focused on trance phenomena from the perspective of psychoacoustics and somatic psychology—areas that continue to shape her thinking about sound, the body, and consciousness. Between 2013 and 2016, she also studied biology at the University of Wrocław, a background that significantly informs her compositional approach.
Her works have been performed by ensembles such as Spółdzielnia Muzyczna Contemporary Ensemble, NeoQuartet, Kompopolex, and Sinfonietta Cracovia, and featured at major contemporary music and interdisciplinary festivals, including Warsaw Autumn, Sacrum Profanum, Musica Electronica Nova, Musica Polonica Nova, Festival of Premieres, Survival Art Review, Art Media Biennale Reverso, IlSuono Contemporary Music Week, Begehungen Festival, Klang Festival, and World Music Days.
She began her musical education at the State Music School in Rybnik, studying piano from 2001 to 2013. Zemla also works across music, visual art, and performance. Together with visual artist Aleksandra Trojanowska, she co-creates the audiovisual duo Anabioses. She frequently composes for theater, collaborating with directors including Gosia Wdowik, Martyna Majewska, Zofia Gustowska, and performer Marcin Miętus (Wrocław Pantomime Theatre, Neumarkt Theater Zürich, Komuna Warszawa, Modrzejewska Theatre in Legnica).
In 2024, the National Museum in Warsaw released the vinyl Naturacea, featuring her commissioned work What Field Whispers—a piece for string orchestra and sensory painting, created for an exhibition dedicated to Józef Chełmoński. In 2025, her piece To Bee or Not to Bee? for flute, clarinet, viola, cello, and electronics will be performed at the World Music Days in Porto, having been selected by both national and international juries. That same year, she received an artistic grant from the City of Wrocław, composing a new work for NeoQuartet.
She is currently pursuing studies in acousmatic composition in Vienna under Annette Vande Gorne. In 2025 completed a short course in film composition at the National Film and Television School (NFTS) in the UK.
he is currently studying acousmatic composition in Vienna under the mentorship of Annette Vande Gorne. In 2025, she completed a film composition course at the National Film and Television School (NFTS) in the United Kingdom.Zemla is a member of the Polish Composers’ Union (ZKP), the Polish Society for Music Theory (PTMW), and the Society of Musicians. Her debut album Discomfort Comes at the Evening was nominated for the Wrocław Artistic Award.
