a gesture through the flames

A model of a play.

2008-01-29

Participants
helen varley jamieson (performer) & online audience; with prerecorded audio by peter winter & sally rodwell.

Duration
approx 20 minutes

Time Frame
from memory, i worked on the piece over several months; it was also reperformed in march 2008

Key Locations
cyberspace – panoplie salon; & wellington nz

Technologies
panoplie – web streaming platform; i used my G4 iBook, a web cam, a desk lamp & a Pollocks toy theatre.

this was a solo performance in which i used a Pollocks toy theatre & figures to tell a tragic love story in images. the soundtrack was the looped & layered voice of sally rodwell saying “the story is mine”. the online audience created their own narrative in the text chat window. everything went pretty well in the performance, & there were some nice touches such as the sound of birds coming from outside (it was a summery morning in wellington) which could be heard by everyone & became part of the performance. I particularly liked how well the Victorian toy theatre worked in the cyberformance context – juxtaposing the old tools of storytelling with the contemporary & steeping everything in the language of theatre.

http://panoplie.emakimono.org/index.php/projets/voir/16
http://creative-catalyst.com/gesture/index.html