Announcing Gabriel Jean-Paul Soomar as Senior Curatorial Fellow for Music Direction and Sonic Practice
In this honorary role, Soomar will provide conceptual guidance and curatorial insight related to music, sound, and sonic practice as they intersect with visual art, architecture, and public spaces. Drawing from his interdisciplinary practice and research into Caribbean sonic cultures, he will support Bakehouse’s commitment to experimentation, expanded artistic definitions, and cross-disciplinary dialogue.
Gabriel is a transdisciplinary designer, creative director, cultural worker, and educator whose work explores how design can register identity, culture, and collective imagination. His practice synthesizes emergent media, cultural analysis, and material experimentation to navigate slippages between pasts, presents, and futures within Black Atlantic spatial imaginary. His design and research contributions have been widely published and exhibited internationally, including at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard, Museum of Modern Art, New York as part of Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America, and the 2023 Venice Architecture Biennale, The Laboratory of the Future, curated by Lesley Lokko. His work engages sound, architecture, and spatial practice as vehicles for collective memory, cultural transmission, and public encounter; he continually seeks to expand the cultural and social impact of architecture.
He holds a Master of Architecture and a Master of Design Studies from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, and a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Miami School of Architecture, where he currently serves as a lecturer. In his teaching, Soomar develops experimental design studios and seminars that integrate body, sound, representation, and spatial theory, emphasizing research-driven practice and interdisciplinary collaboration.
In addition to founding and serving as Creative Director of SALT, Soomar is Creative Director of Studio Barnes. His recent projects include HOLD, a semi-permanent public art installation commissioned for the Wallach Garden at the Radcliffe Institute, Joy Riding, a bespoke sound system with Studio Barnes for the 2025 cycle of Exhibit Columbus, and numerous site-specific installations and research-driven exhibitions across the United States. He is currently working on a custom sound system and an accompanying montage film for the Green Haven Project in Overtown.
As Senior Curatorial Fellow, Soomar will participate in occasional reviews, panels, lectures, workshops, and special initiatives, and will serve as an intellectual and creative resource to artists, curators, and institutional leadership.