Telematic Performance at Warwick
Mark Childs, Centre for Academic Practice,
University of Warwick
Labels
• Virtual performance
• Virtual theatre
• Telematic performance
• Telepresent performance
• Distributed performance
Definitions
the phrase "telematic performance work" refers to the use of a telecommunication network to establish links between two remote spaces at the same time and to present the activities in those two separate spaces variously as a single performance event.
… these activities … make use of the Web as a third performance "space". – Cellbytes http://isa.hc.asu.edu/cellbytes/scott/
Definitions
"telematics" means more than simply videoconferencing, it implies a different awareness of your body and a different engagement with the visual/kinetic information received from the other end (or ends) - Susan Kozel
Virtual Performance
Draws on experiences of technology (specifically virtual reality)
• explores notions of "self", "location" "body/identity"
Exploits advantages of technology
• accessible, mutable, recordable, transferable, innovative, fun
The Telematic Performance
• Susan Kozel, Practitioner based in Vancouver
• First year students at Warwick
• Performance and Practice module
Performance space
• Physical performance space
• Virtual performance space
PCMonitorwebcamera
Hub
P
P
P
uplink
PCMonitorwebcamera
P
P
LaptopData projectorVideo cameraVideo bus
multipoint
P
P P P
screen
Audiences
• Performers can see each other on their computers
• People sit in studio and watch via projection
Activities in workshop
Discussions of concepts Online chat
Structured improvisations– Creating a virtual face and body Follow the leader
Rehearsed performance pieces
Structured improvisations
Rehearsed performance piece
Physical Performance workshop
Videoconferenced physical performance• Took place Friday, 8th March, 2002
• Canterbury and Exeter
• Eastern physical performance
• Performers in one half of studio
• Wall-length screen hung in centre
• Other half of group projected on screen
Why did it fail as a workshop?
• delays in setting up
• low frame rates
• image freezing and speeding up
• time lags
Why did it fail as a workshop?
• Inappropriateness of subject matter
• Selection of activities
• difficulties with communication
• difficulties with performance space
• sightlines
• inappropriate expectations
Solutions
• Include students and staff more in the explorative aspect of the project
• Use the link to demonstrate work rather than work across the link
• Make technology part of what is being explored
Telematic Performance at DMU
DMU performance examples
• Mirroring exercise
• Face
• Global village people
• Timelag demonstration
Differences with Warwick
• Students based at home for 2nd and 4th session
• Dial-up modems created additional difficulties
• Performance and connection from own space created different ‘feel’
Problems with virtual performance
• Immersive?
• Engaging?
• Reliable?
• Lacking corporeality?
• Therefore pointless?
Final Thoughts (1)
The idea of the body displaced in time and space though “performing” in a present, virtual space is not enough (in my opinion) to support the rhetoric and hyperbole that drives much of the web-based activity we are speaking of.
- Johannes Birringer “Connected Dance”
(2) But ...
In response to ADaPT - a performance across six sites involving:
• “live decorporealistions”
• tearing up paper in front of a camera
• multiple images of someone swivelling in a chair
(3) Questions
• Is this a new area for performance work or a few techies getting over-excited by technology?
• Is it a springboard for creativity, or a mask for lack of creativity?
• Is it missing the entire point of theatre, or rediscovering it?
3D Visualisation Group
• Chromakey work
• Motion capture
• Virtual reality models
• Stereoscopic projection
http://www.warwick.ac.uk/ETS/annie
http://www.warwick.ac.uk/3d/
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