I’m not so good at expressing myself with words, so music is my way of communicating with the world. I like this quote from Freya Jarman-Ivens that "queer is dramatising incoherencies," and I feel like my queer/Eastern European/migrant experience is full of contradictions. Working with sound enables me to process and express all of those dissonances and harmonies. I see my art as a form of activism, not delivering answers but posing questions. I am too anxious to engage with direct actions or sometimes even go to protests so I use sound as my form of queer activism.

I have been singing since I started speaking. But I truly found my voice when I worked with Emma Bonnici and her ‘singing as life practice' approach, based on a natural voice technique from Kristin Linklater. Connecting with my body in that way made me a more harmonious being in general. I don’t think I have a specific sound when it comes to music production. I am simply obsessed with eighties sounds and the possibilities of electronic music in general. I learn every day, by watching tutorials or studying coding. I love challenging myself.
I think over the years I learned to understand the importance of not only the melody but the dynamics and the texture of the sound itself. Studying at the Sonology Institute broadened my horizons. I just wish I was more confident in what I am doing. Every release is torture of self-doubts.

I am dedicated to creating space for more diversity. I don’t feel represented in music scenes I like and I want to change that. I want to see more different shapes, bodies, desires and feel welcomed, represented. That’s why I created Mala Herba as a curvy, confident, sexy dark persona. It’s not always easy to do it. In my everyday life, I often wear tents and have many insecurities... But I want to practice self-love and jumping on the stage half-naked. Seeing that so many queer and femme people feel inspired and recognised helps me continue.

The queer sound is more of a question of approach, rather than concrete sound quality. When composing, I like to work with concepts of collectivity, vulnerability, braiding different voices and narratives and thinking about making a space for mistakes

The core of my practice is sharing knowledge and tools. I founded Sounds Queer? in 2015 and curate the programme of workshops, performances, jam sessions, and exhibitions and I teach many workshops. I just wish for younger artists to have a support community, someone to ask questions to. I hope it will make it easier for them to experiment and release their material.

The history of synthesisers and electronic music is full of unsung heroines, pioneers who pushed the meaning of sound, art, and gender norms. I still think that being a femme person with a bunch of gear on a stage is revolutionary.

I always try to come up with a new technique or tool that I learn to use in the process. Or work with the way the sound is composed, not thinking about the result. I like to introduce fragility and mistakes into the compositions or let the compositions be haunted or visited by the “past.”

It’s far from unified and I don’t think balance is my goal. I love contradictions.

I am trying to find little 'queerable' moments in the archives of traditional Eastern European music. I want to find my place in these traditions and counter the narrative that queer people never existed or don’t have a place in the bigoted nationalistic discourse of Polish culture. We have always existed on the fringes. My work looks for those little cracks, that allow me to re-imagine the past.

I think by being openly non-binary and queer I carve this space for myself and others. I often dedicate my work to marginalised communities and strive to make them feel safer and recognised in what I do. May it be a well-wishing spell, a text, a video with different bodies in it. Personally, it is a bit challenging because to be practising magic is something I take very seriously and it requires a lot of energy. I have to be careful to not overdo it and abuse my own strength. To be visible and vocal is both painful and rewarding. I need my community for support, this is why it’s so difficult to be isolated at the moment and alone with my doubts.

It is a constant negotiation, really. On one hand, I believe I have something to say. It’s not a coherent manifesto, I don’t need it to be. I just want to be a dissonant note that stops you for a second. For one person it’s uncomfortable but for the others, it’s this friendly wink: “hey, my sibling, we’re here for each other, we won’t be silenced or destroyed, I love you.” On the other hand, I doubt myself a lot. Should I be taking space? Is it really important or unique what I am doing?

I am really interested in undoing or queering the archive and braiding these different elements with care, love and respect. I believe that traditional culture and music has the power to perform a community and conjure a safer space where different experiences are welcome.
Maybe Polish culture or the way it has been archived is not openly queer but there were spaces for non-normativity and I believe it is possible to read it in a reparative way. To find these little cracks, to re-imagine the past.
I am very inspired by magic as political activism, a sort of different form of agency, by herbalism as an anti-imperialistic knowledge and by demonology as a manifestation of femme vengeance and raw rage. I spend a lot of time searching for texts and melodies that inspire me but it took me twice as long to experiment with how to filter it through my body and electronic music. I am not interested in 'styling' or reconstruction. Rather, I believe that electronic music has the capacity to translate the pulse, the microtonality, the texture and the energy of traditional music in a way that we feel drawn into this primal community of dancing till oblivion.

Please don’t spend the next 5 years daydreaming and doubting yourself. You can do it, now. The first track will be shit but don’t give up. There is a huge community waiting to support you.