Sainerine disfigures classical forms. The "Vancouver, Canada" based project combines opera vocals, experimental synth sound and auto-mutilation carried out with an industrial staple gun. Blood pours over a white dress. The wound is bandaged. Modulation of the flesh parallels modulation of synth signals, pushing a Juno DI into realms of distorted classical music and post-industrial.

 

In Katherine Hillson's 2024 debut work, "Sacrificator / Scarificator", she drained wounds of purity and obedience, struggling to remove a religious birthmark. The work was released on Bent Window Records, covered by Absolute Underground magazine and toured across Canada, playing alongside acclaimed noise artists such as The Rita and Griefer. Accompanying manifestos “Mutilation Autonomy” and “Bloodletting” present Katherine's studies of blood, body autonomy, medicine and religion. 

 

"Sainerine's performance is a heartbreaking and visceral piece exploring themes of religious trauma and bodily autonomy. Her music evokes the beauty of the sacred and the awe of religious experience intertwined with scorn for those who abuse and corrupt the sacred as a means of control. Through including herself as a canvas, she explores the control exerted by religious authority over the body, through a re-framing of harm and it's locus." 

Michael Broadhead

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Her current work, "Operating Theatre" invokes the archetype of the fallen woman and “nineteenth-century opera’s demand for blood sacrifice” (The Undoing of Opera, Susan McClary), as portrayed in classic opera works such as Puccini’s Tosca and Verdi’s La Traviata. The piece has played at Vancouver Noise Fest, curated by Anju Singh, and toured internationally, playing across Canada and in Athens, Greece, curated by Ron Athey.

 

"Blood serves as the material substance which binds and lubricates Sainerine. Bloody currents rush through cultural, religious and political narratives, studying structures of power and the marks they leave upon the body."

Absolute Underground

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Under the guidance of Ron Athey at his Darkness Visible workshop in Athens, Greece, Katherine Hillson is further developing the ideas of the "Operating Theatre" work, turning to French neurologist Jean Martin Charcot's "four stages of the hysteric fit". She analyzes 19th century ideas of female madness in both medicine and opera, hailing Dr. Mary An Smart's interpretation of the Donizetti opera heronie Lucia di Lammermoor: “She goes to the place where nobody can touch her anymore, which is the madness.”   

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"Sainerine's impact on the ambient music scene remains a testament to their fearless exploration of the boundaries between sound, ritual, and societal critique."

OBSKUR Music 

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Sainerine has also scored several short films, including NOFAC3's Threads, which has been screened internationally, as well as the Edmonton Underground Film Festival screening of Maya Derren's A Ritual in Transfigured Time. Her music has appeared on labels OBSKUR Music and Lavender Dream, and has received radio play on Calgary's CJSW and Vancouver's CiTR.