Dear all, Scott's TRANSDANCE research report, as it hardly dwells on dance or bypasses the question of how dancers (trained in a relatively unrestricted motion system) integrate wearables, interference and mapping procedures, raises issues about research condition and conceptual process that interest me a great deal. 1. You write: >> Generally, the 'wearable computer' introduces some motion constraints on the body therefore apparently rendering it less than ideal for the dancer/ performer. However, in Athens, partially due to the presence of the wearable and the nature of the motion that can be performed in it, we were able to engage in questioning the assumptions regarding full body motion that usually come bundled with the concept of choreography and dance.>> 2. Regarding interference, mapping, and systems-transfer, you observe: >> for an experimental (non traditional) artist working with new media, it is normally not sufficient to simply manipulate the surface media as this does not allow for an interrogation of the basic materials or principles of the digital media.........[this refers back to:] "Numeric Representation" outlines the underlying structures of digital, programmable media in ways that support Popper's proposal that the digital artist can intervene not only on the image, but inside the image.>> I suppose your experience in Athens underlined your continuing interest in artistic experimentation with open source and underlying digital structures - intenvening into data, then, not "inside the image" but inside the data scenography?? or am I to understand your perception of, say, live streaming data (mocap data linked to a MAX patch somewhere else) or of a dance captured by real-time Motion Capture and then re-intervened/mapped (by e x c e r p t i n g certain x or y vector data from a capture) onto other animations in a virtual environment as a new way of looking at an emergent event (say, a dance) that will be generated by such surgery? Very fascinating. I wonder what such spliced data would look like once they become "image" or representation/animation of motion again - say, if you took only portions of the x, y, and z vectors and engineered them onto a synthetic dance, what does it look like? You mention Konstantinos Rigos improvising several short segments of varied movement material at one point, and the mocapped data were given to an animator. To what extent does this constitute the kind of collaborative working process you imply, and here I want to quote another crucial passage which deserves discussion in our dance-tech community: >>For TRANSDANCE for example, we had choreographers, digital artists, visual artists, net artists, performance artists and electronic musicians. Each of these categories implies a self referential system in the form of historical and philosophical continuities, of communities and cultural production networks that provide a sense of coherence to any one of these categories of arts practice. >> But you are infact suggesting a new, less coherent model of cooperation -- cross-platform, cross-systems data transfer and synthesis, with unexpected or uncertain emergences, which leaves me to ask how choreographers/dancers (say, in conventional dance programs or in companies) negotiate the interference manipulation on the level of captured or interactively produced data streams in light of a process of "Gestaltung" for a presentational work (for audiences). Or is this kind of migration work intended (with potential commercial applications) for "the notion of the everyday user's body interfacing with the virtual space"? Did Yacov's demonstration with his "wearable" suggest "choreography" (old-fashioned thing, this) or "integration into our daily moment to moment existence....."? Just wondering. I guess I am still pondering the thought-provoking analysis you provided. Johannes Birringer OSU/AlienNation Co. http://www.aliennationcompany.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : 01/24/02