At the intersection of performance, computation, and design, "Proxies" investigates partnering as a site of care. Drawing on research in data privacy, “Proxies” gestures to the idea of how data can be a “stand-in” and an approximation of reality that may miss out on the nuances of lived experience.  Dancers perform constrained relational exercises ("partnering studies") while wearing custom fabricated sensors that capture the kinesthetic dimensions of interaction (intensity and duration of pressure, weight distribution). The dancers' data is rendered into a generative visualization that serves as a score for live musicians to investigate relationship to both instrument and score (reimagined Pyotr Tchaikovsky's 5th Symphony for two musicians). "Proxies" is meant as a provocation to consider what can and cannot be captured through technology. The project is supported by the Knight Foundation, Jacob's Pillow "Pillow Lab", and the (Meta)Lab Data Kinesthetics Symposium at the Harvard ArtLab.

 

Creative Team:

Director, Ilya Vidrin

Visualization: Steven Geofrey

Creative Technologist: Peter Martel

Musicians: Eric Seligman and Mel Hsu

Dancers: Cassie Wang, Hannah Franz, Valeria Solomonoff, Elizabeth Epsen, Melissa Sherman-Bennett, Margot Aknin, and Leah Misano.