Dancing in the Streets, York 2005
Dancing in the Streets was a kinetic light installation, a piece of interactive urban scenography, created by digital artists KMA in collaboration with Leeds academics Scott Palmer and Sita Popat from the School of Performance and Cultural Industries. Commissioned by York City Council as part of their Renaissance project to regenerate the city centre after dark, the installation aimed to get the people of York dancing in the streets. The idea consisted of a projected light installation that would encourage passers-by to ‘dance’, through physical interaction with digitised projections. The installation spanned both art and game aesthetics, engaging shoppers, clubbers and other evening visitors in danced activities in the city streets. Infrared cameras sensed heat from participant’s bodies, triggering digital images projected from above onto the pavement. Images included butterflies, footprints, abstract shapes, lines and ribbons, and a game of ‘football’ using balls of light. The project sought authentically interactive processes in both the design of the installation and the participants’ experiences of it. Notions of play heavily influenced both the creative process and the product that emerged. City inhabitants were asked to engage with the interactive artwork in a location that was neither institutionally associated with art nor even specifically identified as housing an artwork. The lure of the dark yard with occasional circling lights brought the casual passer-by into the role of participant in the game-related context of ‘learning’ what it was and exploring how the ‘rules’ of engagement worked. As the participant discovered the rules, the aesthetic dimension became apparent through the interaction between physical movement and digital projection response. This process of playful discovery resulted in participants moving in space in relation to both the projected light and other bodies - literally dancing in the streets but without being aware that they were doing so. Dancing in the Streets was commissioned by York City Council as part of the York Renaissance Project and was experienced from March to June 2005. The video was filmed and edited by Scott Palmer
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10/13/2015 4:33:56 PM
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