The sophomore album of the sound artist and activist Zosia Holubowska sees their next incarnation as a Wounded Healer.

The collaborative album will be out on 10.10.2024 via White Forest Inc., in digital and zine format. The album is promoted by a new multi-sensory live performance developed in collaboration with Alma Bektas (scenography) and Joanna Zabielska (live visuals).

The original archetype of a wounded healer comes from Greek mythology and the story of a wounded yet immortal centaur Chiron and refers to using one’s trauma and pain as knowledge on how to help others. The artist has long been interested in healing both as an artistic and activist practice and the new Mala Herba’s album is the fruit of their research and engagement. For each track in the new material, the artist has invited a femme sound artist they deeply admire. The guests include Aleksandra Słyż, Resina, and Paula Rebellato of RAKTA.

Musically, the album escapes genres, braiding the artist’s expanding interests. It braids post-folk, drone with left-field electronics and industrial rhythms. Holubowska’s voice oscillates between lyrical storytelling and untamed witchcraft, from ghostly lullabies to punk cries. The musical layer draws from Holubowska’s composer experience with layered textures and uneven, fluctuating rhythms. Yet, it was produced for the dancefloor. For the kind of dance where you let yourself go, drenched in pulsation and something primary that maybe can never be named properly – the experience of breathing in the same rhythm in a community.

The zine version of the album is a true labor of love and passion. The artist invited a spiritual practitioner, poet, or herbalist to create a ritual or a spell inspired by a song. Together they form a multi-lingual collective resource that represents the artist’s main vision: healing is political and can only exist in a community. The guests include acclaimed artist Pedra Costa, Liliana Zeic, Zoe DeWitt of Zero Kama, and Monica C. LoCascio.

The new live performance weaves the record’s musical material, live visuals, stage design, and ritualistic elements. It is based on various healing practices rooted in Slavic traditions and celebrated collaboration as the main force of artistic expression and life itself.

White Forest was born in 2012 with the aim of collecting, enhancing and promoting the most captivating Italian alchemies in the fields of new electronic & digital music. An evanescent borders non-place in which territorial peculiarities and international attitude give life to a plurality of multiform creatures united under intuition and research imprints, in which every expressive singularity is celebrated as the most precious value.

Tracklist
01. Siemieniec feat. Resina
02. Vesnianka feat. Anna Jurkiewicz
03. Chleb feat. Soil Troth 
04. Ani Boga Ani Pana feat. Requiem
05. Uzdrawianie feat. Darja Kazimira
06. Wiły feat. Aleksandra Słyż
07. Siemieniec II feat. Edka Jarząb
08. Nikt feat. Enesi M
09. Lipa feat. rouge-ah
10. Rusaleczki feat. Paula Rebellato
11. Ani Boga Ani Pana feat. Requiem (Rafał Ryterski Remix)