I concur with my colleague Jamie Winterton that “cyber” has become overdetermined and if you’re into understanding how that works you should check out her upcoming event with the Center for Science and Imagination. “Cyber” simultaneously looks to be urgently everywhere while also remaining mystifying for many beyond whatever pleasure there may be in police procedurals. Additionally, while poking fun at a certain someone’s invocation of “the cybers” is an important […]
events
DataPLAY Debuts
FemTechNet’s signal/noise conference, held in Ann Arbor (MI) this weekend, hosted the debut of Vibrant Lives’ DataPLAY. Below is our playbill, which evokes early American playbills that were used to advertise formal theatrical events as well as technological experiences and new medical practices, like those at the World’s Fair or in smaller traveling techno-operas and shows. In many ways the bill and the notion of a debut suggests a polished performance […]
The data playground we sort of knew we were making
A quick overview Last weekend Vibrant Lives premiered three new sculptures commissioned by the Mesa Arts Center. The sculptures, created in collaboration with local artist Bobby Zokaites, were designed to give people a larger-scale experience of real time data shed than we had done in previous events. We consciously chose materials and shapes that would invite bodies to lay, stand, sit, and stretch across the pieces, allowing people to locate […]
Handmade Amplified – A Vibrant Lives Event in Amsterdam
May 21st and 22nd, 2016 Vibrant Lives will be presenting in “Handmade Amplified” in Amsterdam (more precisely, my amazing collaborators Jessica Rajko and Eileen Standley will be presenting their work). This iteration of our research will be realized as a durational performance/installation; a play with potent points of technological and analog dialogue through and of the body. Presented in the 4Bid Gallery as performance and installation of sculpture, photos, and a web […]
Help create a living network piece
I’ve been working lately with the Vibrant Lives team on performative, haptic approaches to understanding data. This first took the form of our Vibrant Lives performance this fall at ASU’s Fall Forward showcase. Since then, we’ve been playing around with lots of different modalities for engaging with data and we’ve been talking a lot – mostly amongst ourselves, but also with folks who have been attending HSCollab’s “Critical Conversations” lunchtime […]
Vibrant Lives at Spark! Festival
Vibrant Lives will be premiering three unique, interactive sculptures at the Spark! Mesa Festival of Creativity, in Mesa, AZ March 18 – 19, 2016 (12pm – 10pm). Our sculptures were constructed in partnership with local sculptor, Bobby Zokaites, and are designed to give festival-goers a sense of their real-time “data shed.” We will also be holding improvisatory performances both nights of the festival. The sculptures use festival-goers’ mobile phone data to produce touch-based […]
Vibrant Lives premiers!
In the tradition of a “soft opening,” the Vibrant Lives interactive performance will be premiering October 2, 3, 4 as a pre-show event for Fall Forward, the kick-off event for the dance season at the the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, School of Film, Theater, and Dance. This is a fantastic opportunity to engage in a live, improvisational performance about every day “data shed.” Guests are encouraged to […]
In Progress: Vibrant Lives
One of the great pleasures of my summer was working with Jessica Rajko and Eileen Standley on our Vibrant Lives project. Our Friday “lab” sessions were exercises in interdisciplinary learning, listening, moving, and playing. The above are two stills from one of our very early movement sessions, in which Jessica, Eileen, and some of our dance collaborators were exploring connected/connecting movement. We moved, we talked about the gravity working to […]
#iwomi and feminist actions
I’m currently somewhere 35,000 feet in the air, roughly over Kansas, making my way back home from the International Workshop on Misogyny and the Internet, aka #iwomi. When working to address violence against feminists, the very act of meeting can be both radical and dangerous. While an event in an elite setting in the U.S. is probably less at risk than meetings of feminists elsewhere, there’s a lot to be […]