otay:onii

Born in Haining, China, and now based in Berlin, Lane Shi develops work under the name Otay:onii that sits between experimental music, performance, installation and film composition. Otay:onii came to attention in the late 2010s with a highly embodied vocal approach, where noise, avant-rock, industrial textures, improvised passages and more stripped-down moments intersect, evoking both contemporary music and ritual forms. Her debut album NAG was released in 2018, followed by MíngMíng 冥冥 in 2021 and Dream Hacker in 2023 — three records that demonstrate a compositional practice in constant motion, ranging from saturation to more narrative and introspective formats. Alongside her releases, Otay:onii presents work at festivals such as CTM, Roadburn and SXSW, in academic and artistic contexts, and contributed to Florentina Holzinger’s opera-performance Sancta. Through Otay:onii, Lane Shi articulates a practice in which voice, body and staging occupy a central place, with a marked attention to questions of experience, displacement and perception.