Month: February 2013

We began by reading extracts from Making a performance: devising histories and contemporary practice by Govan, Normington and Nicholson. Within this book they discuss influences of twentieth-century performance, specifically revolving around the body. From reading this we began to note down the key quotations some of these included:

‘importance of the process of creating work rather than the product’ (Govan, 2007, p. 159).

This applies to Multimedia performance as many ideas will occur in the making process but may not necessarily be part of the final performance however it is vital to the process to influence future ideas.

‘physical performance started as part of a shift away from Stanislavskian approaches to actor training and towards devising performance ‘through the body’’ (Govan et al, 2007, p.159).

As a group we found this importance as the emphasis has shifted from the spoken word to representing emotions and circumstances simply through the body. Examples of this can be physical theatre, circus, mime and dance. Thought then developed from this questioning if we could establish an emotion and then alter this through the additional use of multimedia.

‘At other moments bodies are projected onto so that their identity is changed, or shown to be completely fake’ (Govan et al, 2007, p. 167).

This quote specifically to a performance by the theatre company DV8. This also links to the quote above as an example of being able to manipulate and alter the human body; in this case it is through projection.

‘As the actor tires, the audience loses a sense of watching a rehearsed performance and instead sees the real characteristics of the actor themselves – their exhausted unobliging body attempting to undergo a task’ (Govan et al, 2007, p. 161).

This was an interesting concept as it raises question as to when the performance boundary is crossed. When we stop watching a performance and instead witness the actor putting themselves under great strain for the sake of a performance.

‘pieces exploring the inner lives of ordinary people, and how the external projection of these can seem so unimportant’ (Govan et al, 2007, p. 164).

Particularly for me this struck a chord with me, considering inner and outer lives of a person. How they contradict and cross over but more importantly how the displaying of the two things can alter interpretation.

‘The Builders’ Association from New York are renound for performances that blend live action, film and TV and computer-generated imagery’ (Govan et al, 2007, p. 172).

This quote stood out as one that defined a theatre company that is, in my opinion the epitome of multimedia due to the variety of mediums it uses. Researching further into the theatre company greatly helped to understand exactly what multimedia performance was.

 

The Builders’ Association [Linked]

The Builder’s Association describe their ‘mission’ as the use of ‘new and old tools to extend the boundaries of theatre. Based on innovative collaborations, Builders’ productions blend stage performance, text, video, sound, and architecture to tell stories about human experience in the 21^st century’.

Productions that particularly stood out were ‘House / Divided’ and ‘Continous City’. Both caught my attention because of the use of the space and the mixture between creating images that you could tell were real versus images that looked virtual, creating two very different worlds on one stage. ‘Continuous City’ sparked more of an interest because of its possible link with the subject matter of dreams which we had discussed previously (which can be seen in Frankie’s post [link]). Particularly it was the visual image of varying, multiple screens in this little girls bedroom. It was this image below in which the bedroom looks dense and realistic against the screens connecting with people around the world in the effect of a hologram, invading into her bedroom that caused us to develop it a stage further, having dreams being visually created and entering her bedroom.

 

 

The initial idea occurred as follows:

 

Diagram of how the space might look:

 

 

Examples of media that could be projected onto screens, TV, Ipads, phones etc:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5WfCwQ4IV4 – Sheep jumping over fence

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smJRfxjg9Wo – ZZZ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_rEpjEBC60 – Sleep facts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zqpDVyCB2Y – Sleeping / relaxation music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYSX51xBkos – Science behind dreaming

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlxByc0-V40 – Beyonce “Sweet Dreams”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp9fet2f1Og – Inception

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/my-mad-fat-diary/4od#3473175 – 12:27 – 12:58 – Mad Fat Diary flash back at night time

 

 

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Citations:

Emma Govan, Helen Nicholson, Katie Normington (2007). Making a performance: devising histories and contemporary practice. London: Routledge

Online citations:

beyonceVEVO. (2009). Beyoncé – Sweet Dreams. [Online Video]. 02 October. Available from:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlxByc0-V40. [Accessed: 27 February 2013].

Channel 4. (2013). My Mad Fat Diary, Series 1, Episode 1. [Online Video]. 14 Jan . Available from:http://www.channel4.com/programmes/my-mad-fat-diary/4od#3473175. [Accessed: 27 February 2013].

LoungeVstudio. (2012). RELAX TV ☯ 3 Hours of Relaxing Music, Nature Sounds, Ambient Sleep . [Online Video]. 30 September. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zqpDVyCB2Y. [Accessed: 27 February 2013].

LoungeVstudio. (2012). The Science of Lucid Dreaming. [Online Video]. 10 October. Available from:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYSX51xBkos. [Accessed: 27 February 2013].

mgamelin19. (2011). Cartoon Me Snoring. [Online Video]. 11 August. Available from:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smJRfxjg9Wo. [Accessed: 27 February 2013].

MuddyRiverMedia. (2009). Jumping Sheep. [Online Video]. 13 February. Available from:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5WfCwQ4IV4. [Accessed: 27 February 2013].

NolanFans. (2010). “Shared Dreaming” Clip from INCEPTION. [Online Video]. 02 July. Available from:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp9fet2f1Og. [Accessed: 27 February 2013]

Sharon Connelly. (1933). The Builders Association. Available: http://www.thebuildersassociation.org/index.html. Last accessed 27th Feb 2013.

TheInfographicsShow. (2011). Sleep – The Infographics Show. [Online Video]. 20 March. Available from:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_rEpjEBC60. [Accessed: 27 February 2013].

 

By Nina Woods

 

During the improvisation stage, we decided to experiment by using paper cut outs and card to create a performance. Through this, we found a Dutch theatre company called ‘Hotel Modern’ who created a piece called The Great War. Rather than the story itself, what interested us more about the piece were the aesthetics, the making up of the performance. It had a layered effect. One layer included the story in which toy soldiers, dolls, mud, card, paper amongst other materials were used to create the world in the performance was based in. The second layer being where they had a camera pointing towards the action. Then finally a third layer where the feed was played out on a big screen for the audience to see. All the performers and materials are present on stage. It interested us to see how we could create imagery and tell a narrative or abstract story through the materials. This triggered a reminder for me of a performance that I had seen named Odyssey by ‘A Paper Cinema’. They presented a story not only from paper cut outs but from the result of experimenting with music and sound. This lead us to experimenting with our own cut outs and resources.

Firstly, we made up a barn yard scene and drew our own fences, sheep and even a farmer in a tractor. We wanted to just create a simple, few seconds long video to start with. We were also given a plastic cow and a plastic horse. We made a little video with our resources and our own hands controlling the action.

 

 

After this, we were thinking of how we could do this without having our hands in the video. So we decided to use a ‘Stop Motion’ app on a phone and create the scene again.

 

 

By Francesca Brooks