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EXCERPT
"I
want to make a distinction between (1) subject-content of my
performances, which centres on my many intercultural performative
identities expressed through metabolic and digital processes,
and (2) the methods of constructing and reflecting through individual
and collaborative means.
To
examine this distinction, it was necessary to re-evaluate my
physical journal's inner habitual attitudes towards embodied
choices. This is with regard to "effort" [Laban] as
a response to information coming from out-there in different
situations. These situations included information from my out-there-ness,
from mundane activities like working and domestic tasks, or
recreational activities like performing, practicing martial
arts, or playing sport. The experiential data I collected enabled
me to work with my physical journal [1] as an expressive instrument.
The process allowed me to conceive of new inner attitudes to
influence my bodily actions when developing a new relationship
between the body and the complex network of passive four dimensional
4-D and interactive five dimensional 5-D processes of new technology
concerning performance. These interactions materialize mainly
through me interfacing remotely by 'triggering' an audio-visual
environment via sound-beam -- triggering an 'information environment'
[visuals, sounds, graphics, texts, flash movies, etc] using
sonar technology.
Performative
Acts in 4D and 5D Temporal Space
To
clarify my definition of an information environment: it consists
of four dimensional 4-D events in temporal space that appears
invisible until triggered by a device. This then requires the
intervention of an artistic agent to trigger the events in five-dimensional
5-D. To further unpack this idea, consider a single photograph
depicting a series of movements taken with a long exposure.
The trace-form reveals a blurred image, marking the beginning
and end of an action.
(SPIFF,
unstablelandsacpe IV, Marlon Barrios Solano, Interaktionslabor
2004)
With any printing process there has to be a template from which
successive prints can occur. When we refer to printing in the
fourth dimension, I am not talking about the illusion created
by fast moving pictures in the case of film, but the performance
print in temporal space, which is the blur that is the trace
form.
4-D
events can be seen a apparent prints of an artistic concept
that can
be (a)
static 2D or 3-D images that are viewed over time, or (b) moving
4-D images that are recorded live.
This
takes into account the effects of entropy on artistic objects
and slight variable fluctuations in live performance, in addition
to Roland Barthes' assertion of the death of the writer-artist
and the birth of the reader-audience, shifting attention from
creative meaning to interpretive association (R. Barthes). The
significant distinction is that over a certain period in temporal
space, the apparent performative print of an artistic concept
observed by an audience remains relatively the same. A 4-D template
exists within the body of a performer and is projected virtually
into the performance space from the moment the performer starts
warming up for a public performance. It also exists as a master
cut video, DVD or film. An individual performer's ability to
embody the past/present/future potential movements in temporal
space gives the performer a template to work their successive
prints in temporal space. The use of cues in a rhythm acts as
a way to minimize the experience of uncertainty in an attempt
to make plastic and fix the performance form.
Events
in 5-D can be seen a multiple 4-D events that lay dormant as
information within a spatio-temporal field with trigger points
that require: (a) a
strategic plan of choice within the field of temporal space;
(b) clear
trigger points that are acts of choice for interaction, and
(c)
an artistic agent that understands the strategic plan and is
able to improvise with embodied knowledge and memory (physical
journal) within the field creating an artistic experience for
themselves and an external observer.
When
we consider the print in 5-D, it is no longer something that
is visually evident as a repeatable event. This is primarily
due to the fact that the dimension underpinning choice as part
of its inherent field structure has multiple 4-D possibilities
running simultaneously. A 5-D template exists in the parameters
of an environment allowing the body of the performer choices,
to make decisions and to play in uncertainty as the performer's
physical journal embodies multiple/potential temporal spaces.
The repeatable 'print' from the template of a 5-D field is the
strategic structure of choice that is limited in number. This
is to say that the field of choice within an artistic plan is
not unlimited and that the parameter of the field has an author,
a creator. This field of potential that facilitates change and
difference, can be:
-metabolic
(meaning that the physical journal can have postural techniques
and choreographed or devised phrases embodied within its memory)
-
digital (meaning those 4-D events that are stored in the memory
of a digital device with a control/trigger function).
It is an ability to be at the state of readiness to hold multiple
temporal spaces in the moment within 5-D environment that allows
a group of individuals to respond to uncertainty, which becomes
a key skill. This is underpinned by their rhythmic use of triggers
and set plays to respond to uncertainty, developing the performer
ability to be adaptable and flexible increasing their decision-making
powers. When considering 5-D environments, there are websites
on the internet that offer 3-D virtual temporal space for user
to live out their fantasies and explore their alterities. Here,
like in the role playing game "Dungeons and Dragons",
users create an avatar, a character with a virtual physical
journal [virtual lived body/embodiment].
They
say that it is a 3-D world but this is not strictly true as
everything would be static and there would be no motion or choice
if that were the case. What is meant is that it is a 5-D environment
contextualizing 3-D virtual objects. The implications of these
new spaces are massive when considering the metabolic functions
of our "real" physical journals. The Second Life website
(http://secondlife.com/) is exactly the kind of space where
virtual relationships are replacing real ones and real financial
transactions are exchanged for virtual ones to facilitate and
develop a virtual market place.. [...]
Designing
new computer interfaces
Although
my performative research seeks to contribute concepts surrounding
trans-cultural practice to the performing arts community, it
also has design goals in mind. The goals are to encourage designers
of hardware and software systems who are already researching,
designing and producing new operational environments to devise
and model new computer interfaces which facilitate regenerative
and re-creative activities for the physical journal as an aid
for movement researchers. My aim is to inspire designers to
re-examine ethically the trade-off between performative effort
and new technology as we march to ever more efficient means
to maximize economic production based on capital gain. Competing
for the public' s mobile experience in internet temporal space
is big business. It involves a complex relationship between
companies that are producing hardware (mobile phones, i-pod,
PDA, WAP Jackets and laptops) and software (programmes for communication,
gaming and design in all the creative Industries)."
[1]
Physical journal: the living body with its psychological and
physiological make-up. Taiwo uses the term within a framework
the methodological concepts: 1) the physical journal 2) the
return beat 3) the moble studio practice, and these concepts,
in turn, underpin the assumptions that guide his research into
interactive performative experience of rhythm. Instead of using
the vague term "body", Taiwo prefers the notion of
a "physical journal": the distinction between body
(as something that can be inhabited or is understood as separate
from the performer) and physical journal, for Taiwo, lies in
the idea of the "living" body or processual physical
journal which is the result of living informational processes
that rely on embodied knowledge and memory. This embodied knowledge
and memory has ann unconscious automatic aspect (genetic) and
a conscious habitual asepct (cultural). Both are part of the
concept of the "pysical journal" and are interwoven
in our individual embodied identitidentities. In Taiwo's transcultural
philosophy of performance, the identity is always plural,[cf.
pp. 93-94.]
(Olugbenga
Olusola Elijah Taiwo, Interfacing with my Interface,
Phd thesis, University of Winchester, 2006, pp. 87-91, quoted
with permission)
(Helenna
Ren, Natalie King, Jo Willie Smith in telematic live performance,
Nottingham-Phoenix, "tedr", 1 December 2005, Digital
Cultures festival)
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Design And Performance Lab