Joseph E Burgess

Unregistered Master Builder
(b. 1987) Portland, Oregon, USA. Based in Brisbane, Australia.

Portland-born and Brisbane-based artist Unregistered Master Builder (Joseph E Burgess) works at the nexus of textiles, sound and kinetic art. Through carpet-based performance and custom instrument building, his practice connects the latent political and technological dimensions of textile creation, extracting, highlighting and repurposing the excessive forces and forms embedded in the act of making. Drawing on archival materials and the heritage of technology, his work provokes an ongoing interplay between media, mediums and technical process.

In 2026 Joseph published The Carpet Maker’s Hafted Tool: A Hackable Instrument for Sonoric Textile Practice in the proceedings of New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME) 2026.

Artist statement

Central to Joseph’s carpet-making practice is the concept of sonotextility¹, which describes the gestalt co-emergence of sound and textile practices in human cultural and cognitive development. Rooted in Material Engagement Theory, sonotextility foregrounds the shared material logics of music and textile: tension, rhythm, repetition, patterning, and the embodied manipulation of flexible media.

Through these material interactions, the body of physical work reflects the monumentality and ubiquity of textiles in technology and language, reaffirming the communicative capacity of textiles² and the relevance of textile practice under the ever-looming presence of intangible and immaterial notions of technology in contemporary media.

1. Burgess, J., Gifford, T., & Wixted, A. The Carpet Maker’s Hafted Tool: A Hackable Instrument for Sonoric Textile Practice. NIME 2026.
2. Langlois, G. (2023). How Textile Communicates: From Codes to Cosmotechnics.

Awards and grants

2026 — Queensland Art Project Fund (QAPF), Sonotextility
2025 — First Prize, Best Music, New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME), Canberra
2020 — Science in Focus, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane

Solo exhibitions

2026 — Sonotextility, KEPK, Brisbane
2022 — This Light, Metro Arts, Brisbane
2021 — National Rug Association, QCA Project Gallery, Queensland College of Art, Brisbane

Group exhibitions

2026 — Nature Machine: 6th Tamworth Textile Triennial, curated by Blake Griffiths, Tamworth Regional Gallery; touring to eleven Australian venues 2026–29
2026 — Axis Mundi by Amanda Bennetts, audio installation (composer), NEW26, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA), Melbourne
2025 — What Falls Must Be Pushed, Firstdraft, Sydney
2022 — Phototropism, curated by Amanda Bennetts and Warwick Gow, Horizon Festival, Noosa
2021 — Light Industrial, Woolstores, Teneriffe, Brisbane

Performance

2026 — MONO 59, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane
2026 — MONO × IAG, curated by Lawrence English
2025 — Carpet Entanglement, NIME 2025, Australian National University, Canberra
2025 — ANAT Spectra, University of the Sunshine Coast
2024 — Stealth Care, Outer Space, Brisbane
2024 — Private Views, Norla Dome, Melbourne
2024 — International Symposium on Electronic Art (ISEA), Brisbane
2024 — URMB × Modular Square, Modular Square, Paris
2023 — OHM Festival, Bodies, Brisbane Powerhouse
2023 — (Untitled) (Death Song), University of Queensland Art Museum, Brisbane

Curation and programming

2020– — Director, KEPK artist-run space, Brisbane. Artists programmed include Barker & Boris (Berghain, DE), Spekki Webu (NL), Woody92 (NL), KOP32 (FR), Passepartout Duo (IT/US), Ryosuke Kiyasu (JP), Moritz Simon Geist (DE), Motoko Kikkawa, Phil Treloar, Xenosine, Phasmid, Metapattern, Harold
2026 — Sonotextility, curator and programmer, KEPK, Brisbane
2026 — The Marvellous Corricks, producer and performer; live scores for the NFSA Corrick Collection with Reel Moving Cinema, Palace James St, Brisbane
2024 — ADA × DRONE, with Karina Smigla-Bobinski (PL/DE), curator and composer, World Science Festival, Brisbane

Publications

2026 — Burgess, J., Gifford, T. & Wixted, A. The Carpet Maker’s Hafted Tool: A Hackable Instrument for Sonoric Textile Practice. Proceedings of NIME 2026
2025 — Burgess, J. & Gifford, T. Threading the Sound: The Carpet Tufting Gun as an Electroacoustic Performance Interface. Proceedings of NIME 2025
2025 — Burgess, J. Carpet Entanglement. NIME 2025 Music Proceedings
2024 — Burgess, J. CPEGs: The Aesthetics of Digital Signal Processing in Pictorial Carpet-Making Practice. Proceedings of ISEA 2024

Collaborative projects

2024 — Mobile World Congress, Onionlab, 3D artist and consultant, Barcelona
2022– — Ephemeral Oceanic (Atelier Sisu), composer and international installation manager, Vivid Sydney and world tour
2019 — Harps of the City, Vivid Sydney, Curiocity, Woodford Folk Festival; acquired by the Museum of Old and New Art and the University of Queensland

Releases

2024 — Amplification Affirmation: Location Spirit Song, Libby Harward & Unregistered Master Builder
2024 — A Gift from Upper Management, Unregistered Lodges
2024 — Unregistered Master Builder, full-length album
2024 — ADA +, commissioned by World Science Festival
2023 — Les Portes, commissioned by Atelier Sisu
2022 — Aperture, commissioned by Atelier Sisu

Positions

2026 — Program Officer, State Library of Queensland, Brisbane
2026 — Beyond Frames, contractor, Sharing the National Collection, National Gallery of Australia
2023–25 — Course Coordinator, University of the Sunshine Coast
2022– — Research Assistant, University of Queensland, Brisbane

Residencies

2022 — Post House, Reykjavík, Iceland
2022 — United Artist Projects, Brisbane

Education

2026 — NIME 2026 Student Consortium, selected participant
2023–26 — Master of Philosophy, Sonotextility, University of the Sunshine Coast

Contact

For bookings and enquiries: unregisteredmasterbuilder@gmail.com
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