Creating and sustaining a basis for life-long learning in tertiary dancer training

This paper acknowledges the influences that a generation Y population brings to dance training methodologies and examines this impact in a tertiary context. Over the last 4 years, Queensland University of Technology has been modifying their curriculum for new students transitioning from the private dance studio into the prevocational university environment. An intensive training program was designed to empower the student creating effective entry points for common understandings in the learning and teaching of dance techniques with improved and accelerated learning outcomes. This paper shares these philosophies and practices in training for life-long learning that prepare the young dancer for longevity in the industry.

The educational affordances of generative media in arts education

Network Jamming systems provide real-time collaborative media performance experiences for novice or inexperienced users. In this paper we will outline the theoretical and developmental drivers for our Network Jamming software, called jam2jam. jam2jam employs generative algorithmic techniques with particular implications for accessibility and learning. We will describe how theories of engagement have directed the design and development of jam2jam and show how iterative testing cycles in numerous international sites have informed the evolution of the system and its educational potential. Generative media systems present an opportunity for users to leverage computational systems to make sense of complex media forms through interactive and collaborative experiences. Generative music and art are a relatively new phenomenon that use procedural invention as a creative technique to produce music and visual media. These kinds of systems present a range of affordances that can facilitate new kinds of relationships with music and media performance and production. Early systems have demonstrated the potential to provide access to collaborative ensemble experiences to users with little formal musical or artistic expertise.This presentation examines the educational affordances of these systems evidenced by field data drawn from the Network Jamming Project. These generative performance systems enable access to a unique kind of music/media’ ensemble performance with very little musical/ media knowledge or skill and they further offer the possibility of unique interactive relationships with artists and creative knowledge through collaborative performance. Through the process of observing, documenting and analysing young people interacting with the generative media software jam2jam a theory of meaningful engagement has emerged from the need to describe and codify how users experience creative engagement with music/media performance and the locations of meaning. In this research we observed that the musical metaphors and practices of ‘ensemble’ or collaborative performance and improvisation as a creative process for experienced musicians can be made available to novice users. The relational meanings of these musical practices afford access to high level personal, social and cultural experiences. Within the creative process of collaborative improvisation lie a series of modes of creative engagement that move from appreciation through exploration, selection, direction toward embodiment. The expressive sounds and visions made in real-time by improvisers collaborating are immediate and compelling. Generative media systems let novices access these experiences with simple interfaces that allow them to make highly professional and expressive sonic and visual content simply by using gestures and being attentive and perceptive to their collaborators. These kinds of experiences present the potential for highly complex expressive interactions with sound and media as a performance. Evidence that has emerged from this research suggest that collaborative performance with generative media is transformative and meaningful. In this presentation we draw out these ideas around an emerging theory of meaningful engagement that has evolved from the development of network jamming software. Primarily we focus on demonstrating how these experiences might lead to understandings that may be of educational and social benefit.

Indig-curious : what are the challenges for non Aboriginal theatre practitioners in accessing and interpreting Aboriginal themes?

How do non-Indigenous theatre practitioners, especially actors, access and incorporate Aboriginal themes in the plays they create or perform in? Will it ever be acceptable for a non-Aboriginal actor to play an Aboriginal role? In literature there are clear protocols for writing Aboriginal characters and themes. In the visual arts and in dance, non-Indigenous practitioners might 'reference' Aboriginal themes, but what about in theatre performance? This research embodies one cultural dilemma in a creative project and exegesis: exploring the complex issues which emerge when an Aboriginal playwright is commissioned to write an 'Aboriginal themed' play for two non-Aboriginal actors.

Tango Femme : placing the lesbian centre stage

The play Tango Femme places the lesbian centre stage by creating characters, narrative and drama in the world of same-sex dancing. The accompanying exegesis examines the problems and issues associated with creating lesbian characters in theatre, using a synthesized, practice led methodology. During the process of imagining, constructing and writing my case study play, I have investigated lesbian theatre productions and companies in order to make sense of my personal experiences in the theatre world. I have also reflected on the lesbian as represented in mainstream theatre and popular culture. Through journal writing and contemplation, I have sought to identify difficulties inherent in writing this type of play, using my own journey as a focus. My study illuminates the historical and sociological circumstances in the eighties and nineties in Australia and concludes that as a lesbian playwright I was caught between a rock and a hard place: the rock being lesbian theatre on a community level, as defined and attended primarily by separatist lesbians, and the hard place being mainstream theatre, located within the dominant, heteronormative discourse. The play Tango Femme has developed in conversation with my reflective practice and research and is written in the space outside the master narrative as "an instance of lesbian discourse" (Davy 1996, p.153).

Devising a scenographic approach in Jonzi D's Hip Hop theatre

Jonzi D, one of the leading Hip Hop voices in the UK, creates contemporary theatrical works that merge dance, street art, original scored music and contemporary rap poetry, to create theatrical events that expand a thriving sense of a Hip Hop nation with citizens in the UK, throughout southern Africa and the rest of the world. In recent years Hip Hop has evolved as a performance genre in and of itself that not only borrows from other forms but vitally now contributes back to the body of contemporary practice in the performing arts. As part of this work Jonzi’s company Jonzi D Productions is committed to creating and touring original Hip Hop theatre that promotes the continuing development and awareness of a nation with its own language, culture and currency that exists without borders. Through the deployment of a universal voice from the local streets of Johannesburg and the East End of London, Jonzi D creates a form of highly energized performance that elevates Hip Hop as great democratiser between the highly developed global and under resourced local in the world. It is the staging of this democratised and technologised future (and present), that poses the greatest challenge for the scenographer working with Jonzi and his company, and the associated deprogramming and translation of the artists particular filmic vision to the stage, that this discussion will explore. This paper interrogates not only how a scenographic strategy can support the existence of this work but also how the scenographer as outsider can enter and influence this nation.

COLLABORATORY : characteristics of collaborative creativity

Teaching and learning in working groups is a challenge to both teacher and student. Collaboration is an elusive concept, difficult to teach, impossible to enforce, yet the ability to work in this way is an essential characteristic of any Creative Industries professional. In 2006, a group of creative industries students were charged with the task of collaboratively creating a performance as part of their coursework. This research project closely followed their development as agents of collaborative creativity using an innovative methodology which combined performance and documentary making. The result is COLLABORATORY - a DVD documentary isolating key behaviours and features of collaborative learning: Convergence and divergence of ideas, Characters and behaviours in collaboration, Leadership and facilitation, Motivation and Intersubjectivity. An engaging presentation of theory and practice capturing what Meill and Littleton (2004) call “the emotional dance of collaboration”.

Grounded Light

A promenade performance. This research produced a unique combination of performance using electronically augmented costuming, site-specific discrete electronic lighting and video projection and sustained mountainside/top choreography. The work was examined and expanded in two subsequent peer reviewed papers which scoped out the emerging field of ‘Grounded Media’. Curator and writer Kevin Murray further accorded and enhanced these ideas in subsequent critical writing and the work was also featured in a two page major profile in RealtimeThe work was commissioned by the long established Floating Land Festival and involved extensive on-site work as well as a residency, production and artist talk series at the Noosa Art Gallery. A documentary film of the work was subsequently presented in the three-month exhibition ‘Lines of Sight’ for the Nishi Ogi Machi Media Festival, Nishiogikubo Station Platform 1, Tokyo, Japan, curated by Youkobo Art Space.

The making and placing of The Escalators

The band The Escalators together with the music uniquely composed for it and a subsequent CD and DVDs was the work that emerged from my period of research. The areas of interest that were investigated were sampling, minimalism, stasis, the work of David Lynch, as well as a desire to produce new and innovative music. The above concepts defined the bands composition and makeup. While each may be regarded as a discreet concept with its own boundaries in my work they seamlessly intermingle resulting in that which is unique to The Escalators sound. The research methodology used for this work was practice led research.

IDOL

Idol is a collaborative performance work for vocal performer and dancers. The work explores movement and sound relative to a vocal interface called the eMic (Extended Microphone Interface Controller). The eMic is a gestural controller designed by the composer for live vocal performance an real-time processing. The process for generating the work involves the choreographer being provided an opportunity to experiment with gestures ad movement relative to the eMic interface. The choreographer explored the interface as an object,a prop, an instrument and as an extension of the body. the movement was then videoed and the data coming from the sensors simultaneously recorded. The data and the video were then used as part of the compositional process, allowing the composer to see what the performance looks like and to experiment with mapping strategies using the captured sensor data. This approach represents a new compositional direction for working with the eMic, in that previously the compositional process commenced at the computer, building processing patches and assigning parameters to eMic sensors. In order to play the composition, the body needed to adapt to 'playing' the instrument. This approach treats the eMic like a traditional instrument that requires the human body to develop a command over the instrument. Working with the movement as a starting point inverts the process using choreographic gestures as the basis for musical structures.

PIPP #2 : Pedestrian Interaction Patch Project

Presented as part of the Sampled Festival at Sadlers Wells UK in January 2009, PIPP #2 continues the exploration of the first installation (PIPP #1 Leeds) and asks audiences to connect with an interactive work presented in the foyer of a major dance festival. Literally choreographing their own dances on the walls of the venue, pedestrians re-connect with the architectural surrounds generating unique memories of self.

The Silk Road project

The Silk Road Project was a practice-based research project investigating the potential of motion capture technology to inform perceptions of embodiment in dance performance. The project created a multi-disciplinary collaborative performance event using dance performance and real-time motion capture at Deakin University’s Deakin Motion Lab. Performances at Deakin University, December 2007.