Backstage
London
2018
Backstage – bringing the audience behind the scenes. The idea was to shift the space, the dancer is placed behind the screen and the audience in front being able to only see the performers shadow and the composer, therefore, the audience would feel that they are sitting backstage while observing the system as a whole and how it works.
We have a director/conductor composing the environment using the kinect ( set of 5 environments, every environment goes with (1) a visual effect, linked to (2) a choreography, and (3) a mode (2 for robotic, 2 for human and 1 heartbeat).
The Kinect sensors the hands position and shape. Knowing how to produce the modes the conductor follows the sound of the music and decides which mode to project.
The dancer is triggered by the visuals projected and her body reacts to the environment she is perceiving, thus, every visual effect has its own short dance choreography. In other words, the composer is controlling the performer.
In the beginning, the performer is asleep, wakes up in a robotic cold mode, starts feeling her heartbeat and transforms into a sensual warm human; her moves become softer and more fluid along with the screen that becomes a composition of edgy shapes for the robotic mode and organic curvy shapes for the human mode, the heartbeat mode is a rhythmic line transitioning between the 2 modes.