How do you behave in group? How does the group behave in you?
For the past year I've been building a room that listens.
AHFSD it's a performance for ten people at a time. You pick a card, put on a pair of glasses, walk in and the room reads how you move, how many of you there are, how close you stand, whether you're moving together or each on your own.
Gradually, it answers, in sound and light. There's nothing to get right.
No instructions, no task, no correct way to behave.
And no direct, immediate answer, more a reflection: can you sense safety?
At times everything could sound pressed and saturated, as if the space were holding its breath. Slow down and small, delicate sounds come out of hiding. Spread across the floor and the air turns grainy. And if the ten of you happen to find a shared rhythm or shared space, a melody surfaces, voice and guitar step forward, the sound lifts off and circles overhead like a flock of birds.
The light answers too, but slower — it holds and fades where the sound is immediate, so a movement you make can stay visible for a few seconds after it has stopped being audible. Stand still and the light will settles low around you.
Room can be warm, can be strobe. If at any point you'd rather watch than take part, you can. Step to the edge of the
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How do you behave in group? How does the group behave in you?
For the past year I've been building a room that listens.
AHFSD it's a performance for ten people at a time. You pick a card, put on a pair of glasses, walk in and the room reads how you move, how many of you there are, how close you stand, whether you're moving together or each on your own.
Gradually, it answers, in sound and light. There's nothing to get right.
No instructions, no task, no correct way to behave.
And no direct, immediate answer, more a reflection: can you sense safety?
At times everything could sound pressed and saturated, as if the space were holding its breath. Slow down and small, delicate sounds come out of hiding. Spread across the floor and the air turns grainy. And if the ten of you happen to find a shared rhythm or shared space, a melody surfaces, voice and guitar step forward, the sound lifts off and circles overhead like a flock of birds.
The light answers too, but slower — it holds and fades where the sound is immediate, so a movement you make can stay visible for a few seconds after it has stopped being audible. Stand still and the light will settles low around you.
Room can be warm, can be strobe. If at any point you'd rather watch than take part, you can. Step to the edge of the floor and the room stops reading you; take the glasses off and you leave the system entirely. Neither is a failure, and you can step back in, whenever you like.
I'm on the floor the whole time, among you — and my playing is treated by the system exactly like everything else, so it can be revealed or swallowed depending on what the room does. What the piece becomes is up to whoever is in it.
Take hardcAre,
Slon aka Marco Mercuzio Peron
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