Hors de L'ordinaire

Hors de L’ordinaire

Freedom expressed through dance

Hors de L’ordinaire

Dimana Sofianska

Btk Hochschule für gestaltung by– Dimana Sofianska, Dulce Berlin, Germany Dimana.sofianska@

Villegas, Ece Eti, Tara Salibi

Dancer: Franka Fetzer

Dulce Villegas

“Hors de L’ordinaire” is a performance piece that expresses one’s desire to step out of the ordinary.

The installation tells the story of the dancer in the Ece Eti music boxfürtrapped Btk – Hochschule gestaltung in the repetitive mechanical Berlin, Germany movement of its existence and her chance to execeeti@gmail.com perience freedom. The box characterizes one‘s Tara Salibi entrapment in the comfort zone, and the dancer Btk – Hochschule für gestaltung symbolizes every person trying to discover what Berlin, Germany salibi.tara@gmail.com lies outside „the box“.

Btk – Hochschule für gestaltung Berlin, Germany d.mar.vn21@gmail.com

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supports three different publication options: The piece portrays escaping the routine and exploring further boundaries that are usually hindered • ACM copyright: ACM holds the copyright on the work.

This is the historical approach. by the comfort zone. By trying to test their own limits every person breaks their daily mechanism • License: The author(s) retain copyright, but ACM receives an exclusive publication license. in order to make a step further towards a new• goal Open or dream.

This break is the portal to new expeAccess: The author(s) wish to pay for the work to be open the access.strong The additional fee must be paid to ACM. riences of freedom. The choreography describes distinction between being trapped in This text field is large enough to hold the appropriate release statement assuming it is single-spaced in Verdana 7is point font. Please into liberty of repetition and releasing oneself out of the norm.

This dream of freedom translated do not change the size of this text box.

Each submission will be assigned a unique DOI string to be included thought as well as movement. here.

Abstract “Hors de L’ordinaire” is a performance piece that expresses one’s desire to step out of the ordinary. The installation tells the story of the dancer in the music box trapped in the repetitive mechanical movement of its existence and her chance to experience freedom.

The box characterizes one‘s entrapment in the comfort zone, and the dancer symbolizes every person trying to discover what lies outside „the box“.

Author Keywords Authors’ choice; of terms; separated; by semicolons; include commas, within terms only; required.

world with the digital world to create a multi sensorial installation which is transmitting a message to the audience. The movement of the body are very essential to help represent the idea and we tried the make the most of it by also digitalizing this movement to strengthen the combination between this two worlds.

The installation has a narrative character telling a story about escape and freedom. The main inspiration for the creation of such work was the ability of dance to translate feelings and emotions through the movement. This collaboration gave live to a dance performance installation which not only combines different media but also gives a sensorial experience to the audience.

ACM Classification Keywords H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI): Miscellaneous; See http://acm.org/about/class/1998 for the full list of ACM classifiers. This section is required.

Introduction This installation is a the product of a collaboration between DOCK11&EDEN***** dance studios and BTK Berlin School of Arts and Design. This gave us not only inspiration but also a place for an exhibition. Within many fields DOCK11&EDEN***** also interprets fine arts and dance art installation which includes many dance styles as means of self expression through once body. The core of the project was to find a middle ground between Media Spaces and Dance performance which resulted in a multimedia installation which highlights the body ability of communication. The purpose of the project is trying to fuse together the physical

Figure 1: The Exhibition space for our installation provided by Dock11

Related Works To make up for our inexperience in the field of dance our project required a lot of research and discovery.

Delving further into the world of dance we came across many references which spiked our interests in relation to our project. The first example that we found amusing is Ljos which explores the deep connection between light, space, sound and movement. The visuals are synchronized to the dancer to allow the viewer to merge into the surreal and dream like space. The concept of the installation is to show freedom of movement and brings the audience into a no gravity immersive experience. The additional layer provided by the visuals demonstrates ultimate freedom since it symbolizes movements on a different dimension that are impossible to grasp on the human plane. This combination between the visuals and the body helps us understand how impactful it is to experience the different phases of freedom through dance.

Figure 2: Ljos, a multimedia dance installation by Mattia Carretti, Luca Camellini

middle point between the imaginary and the real world.

What we found very intriguing in this project is the ability to combine flawlessly the virtual space defined by projection and the movement of the dancer which are perfectly synchronized together. This project plays also with the role of the audience. This performance takes away the usual scenario of the audience being in front of the stage and centralized the performance letting the perceiver walk around it.

Figure 3: Hakanai, a multimedia dance installation by Adrien M & Claire B

DAYDREAM is an audiovisual installation that generates space distortions. This art work aims at establishing a physical connection between the virtual space and the real space, blurring the limits and submerging the audience into a short detachment from reality. Lights generate abstract spaces while sounds define the echoes of virtual spaces.The way of showing he audience the transition between physical reality and daydreaming is inspiring and also the formal language of the installation itself is very eye-catching and memorable.

Hakanai, another dance installation that also touches the topic of an alternated reality by depicting the concept of dreams and their fragility, which is also the definition of its name. This artwork combines the digital with a performance to illustrate the importance of the Figure 4: Daydream, a light installation by Noemi Schipfer & Takami Nakamoto

nism in order to make a step further towards a new

Figure 5: A storyboard of the installation

Concept „A music box or musical box is an automatic musical instrument that produces sounds by the use of a set of pins placed on a revolving cylinder or disc so as to pluck the tuned teeth (or lamellae) of a steel comb.

They were developed from musical snuff boxes of the 18th century and called carillons à musique. Some of the more complex boxes also contain a tiny drum and/ or bells in addition to the metal comb.“ (Lambert Castle) The mechanism of the music box always rotates in a timely, uniform, and monotonous manner. Any attempt to force it to rotate counter its mechanism will only cause its defect.

The music box is the major inspiration for the setting of the installation. The traditional music box was created by Luis Favre, a watchmaker from Geneva. Favre’s origins as a French speaker also inspired the name of our project “Hors de L’ordinaire” which means „out“ or „outside“ of the ordinary. The piece portrays escaping the routine and exploring further boundaries that are u sually hindered by the comfort zone. By trying to test their own limits every person breaks their daily mecha-

goal or dream. This break is the portal to new experiences of freedom. The choreography describes the strong distinction between being trapped in repetition and releasing oneself out of the norm. This dream of freedom is translated into liberty of thought as well as movement. Just like the mechanism of the music box, when the dancer tries to do something out of the ordinary, this causes the defect of the virtual „mechanism“ of the box.

Storyline The installation begins with a live performance of the dancer executing a set of 8 repetitive movements in the box until she tries to break the repetition or routine by trying to reach the extremities of the box seeming as if she is trying to escape. This movement countering her usual routine with create a defect in the system causing the lights to glitch. This will trigger the dancer’s imagination which is represented by the projection which starts as the box is turned off and the dancer dreams.

Figure 6: A photorealistic representation of the installation

Realization

Figure 7: Inspiration for the formal language of the installation

The installation has the form of a light box in which the dancer is trapped. The light box is a metaphor of the boundaries we all experience in our lives and portrays the comfort zone. The box is a cube of 2m per side made out of 12 PVC tubes with an outer diameter of 40mm, 8 three-way steel connectors and 24m of LED lights. The LEDs are connected by soldering to a DMX transistor that enables us to control the lights from a computer via USB which receives data from Resolume Arena 5. Arena reads a black and white composition video created in After Effects, associating white color to turn on the lights and black color to turn them off. This is how the play of lights occurs. The visuals are projec

ted on a corner created by two large panels behind the box by two projectors suspended from the ceiling. The two projectors are placed in a 90 degree angle from each other and mapped to give one continuous output.

The content of the visuals representing freedom are a post production of a combination of a recorded dance performance and digitally created effects using the green screen technique. The programs used to implement those effects were Cinema 4D and After Effects.

The sound will be emitted from speakers dispersed around the box. The installation will be exhibited at a studio during a special event hosted by Dock 11 Kastanienallee.

Conclusion

References

The message behind our story aims to show the contrast between the comfort zone and freedom. The definition of those terms are left to the audience’s own interpretation. Either one can be associated to positive or negative terms. The idea is to encourage the exploration of one’s limits without being set back by the reassurance of the comfort zone. This makes the person understand where they stand in their own existence, and asses wether they have too much freedom or lack there of. The introspection we hope to trigger, relates to every person in their own way and its left to personal self reflection.

1. Dock 11 & Eden studios. Retreived: 01 July 2017 http://www.dock11-berlin.de/

Acknowledgments We would like to thank to Pr. Claudia Rohrmoser & Florian Kühnle for their help and advice for the creation of this project. We would like to acknowledge Dock11 for the collaboration and for the opportunity of exhibiting the installation to the audience. Also we would like to thank the dancer Franka Fetzer for providing her knowledge and abilities in the completion of this project.

2. Figure 2: Fuse. 2014. Ljos. Retrieved: 01 july 2017. http://fuseworks.it/en/project/ljos_en/ 3. Figure 3: Adrien M & Claire B. 2013. Hakanai. Retrieved: 01 July 2017. http://www.amcb.net/projets/ hakanai 4. Figure 4: Noemi Schipfer & Takami Nakamoto. 2013.

Daydream. Retreived: 01 july 2017. http://nonotak. com/_DAYDREAM-V-2 5. Lambert Castle. Copyright 2000-2016 Pasaic Country Historical Society. The age of Music box. Retrieved: 01 July 2017 https://lambertcastleweb.wordpress.com/ the-age-of-the-music-box/