Press Releases December 2005

December 2005

Conceived by Margie Medlin in collaboration with and Stevie Wishart musical director, Rebecca Hilton, choreographer; Holger Deuter , DNA 3d-animation character design real - time set-up; Gerald Thompson, motion control camera robot; Nick Rothwell, interface designer.

Quartet is a dance, music and new-media performance that observes and articulates communication and perception of the human body. It will explore and create real-time relationships between music, the gesture of playing music, dance, robotics and animation.

The cast of Quartet comprises of a dancer, a musician, a motion controlled robotic camera, and a 3D virtual dancer. The virtual dancer will be projected into the performance space whilst the rest of the cast will perform on individual raised platforms, and an additional projection will show the real-time view point of the robotic camera. The performance will take place within a museum space so that in effect each performer becomes an exhibit through which to discover and contemplate. The audience of Quartet will be presented with a sensorial experience of movement and an understanding of the sophistication of human interaction through technology and performance.

At the core of Quartet is the exploration of how information travels from one body to another and the translations that occur in the process. Using interactive technologies a flexible framework will be created in order to pass information between the performers of Quartet which will be interpreted through the virtual dancer. The dancer will send information on movement to the motion control robot camera via sensors on the dancers body. The dancer will cause the virtual dancer to become animated via the motion control robot. The musician will also augment the movement of the virtual dancer through sound and gesture analysis. There will be no preconceived ideas as to how the virtual dancer should move, rather Quartet will explore the potential and push the boundaries of how interaction of different elements can be controlled in unforeseen ways.

Quartet will investigate what degree of realism in the virtual body can be observed through the live musician?s and dancer?s speech, gestures, sounds and movements, and what aspects make the virtual dancer become ?human? and make the audience aware of this through their own suspension of disbelief.

Choreographer, Rebecca Hilton is interested in how human movement is fused with narrative, emotion and human values. She has observed that these inherent traits cannot be directly translated into the virtual dancers movements. In order for the virtual dancer to acquire such human characteristics and to be believable to the audience, systems will be created to illustrate the expressiveness and independent thinking of the virtual body.

An integral part of this system will be the translation of the sounds and gestures of playing music. Sensors will be attached to the arm of a musician whilst playing a violin and hurdy gurdy. The musicians gestures and the sounds of the instrument will be analyzed and used to create a software interface that determines how the virtual dancer moves in terms of which body part and the speed and angle of movement, etc. When the music and gesture is translated to the virtual dancer as movement it will form different characteristics such as a quick sequence of movements indicating reasoning, or a slow sequence showing contemplation.

By finding the points where the dancer and musician have embodied the robot camera and the virtual dancer, an all encompassing experience will be created. The performance will encompass multiple perspectives, through which the audience will engage in a sensorial experience of the movement of the dancer. Visually they will see the dancers movements, which will be enhanced by the interpreted movements of the robot camera and virtual dancer. They will see the dancers view point through the real-time film taken from the robot camera. They will also become aware of how music is interpreted as movement through hearing the sound compositions of the musician and seeing the virtual dancer be animated by them.

Credits for Quartet

Margie Medlin ? Concept and direction Stevie Wishart ? Musical concepts and direction / live composer-musician. Rebecca Hilton - Choreographer Holger Deuter - DNA 3d-animation character design Gerald Thompson ? Motion control camera robot Nick Rothwell ? Interface designer Ir. Todor Todoroff - sensor & sound analysis development & Engineering, for the music concept realization. Carl Faia - Sound spataliazation & max msp integration of components for the music concept realization. Nik Gaffney - FoAm Hardware design for the music concept realization. Glenn Anderson - Electrical engineer and software programmer, motion control camera robot. Scott Ebdon - Robot Maker Michael Koch - 3D character real- time set up Lars Maria Schnatmann- 3d software developer

In collaboration with The Physiological Laboratory, Cambridge University, the project is part funded by a Sciart Production Award (2005-2006) from the Wellcome granted to the Quartet project and Stevie Wishart.

?Quartet? is Co-produced with the Performance & Digital Media department of the ICA Institute of Contemporary Art, London. Other funding partners include The Arts Council of England, The New Media Board and International Community Partnerships and Market Development of the Australia Council for the Arts and Arts Victoria Cultural Exchange program.

With project support from /////// / |< ||| | ZKM | Zentrum fuer Kunst und Medientechnologie. Germany. http://www.zkm.de/ & STEIM "Studio for Electro Instrumental Music" Amsterdam.http://www.steim.nl