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"Living Picture" is an art experience in Second Life that combines a short contemporary music video piece and a dance sequence in SL of one or more avatars in phase shift. The video and dance sequences run in a loop, 24/24. I called this technique "phase dance" in tribute of the "phase music" created by Steve Reich and Terry Riley in the 1960s/70s.
During my research to create immersive ballets that used video as the main set element in Second Life, I was confronted with an unsolvable problem : in Second Life, each viewer sees the video according to his or her internet connection and computer power. This means that no two viewers see the same video at the same time and any choreography is necessarily out of sync with the choreographer's project.
PHASE DANCE
I therefore considered this constraint as a component of my creation by designing choreographies that are in phase with the video, no matter when the spectator receives it. There are obviously differences in phase, rhythm and movements that may appear discordant, but this is part of the imperfect beauty of the work.
Moreover, the dance sequence is shorter or longer than the video sequence. Thus, no matter when the spectator watches the show, the sequence is unique. It attends an artistic moment which will never be reproduced again. As such, I create in Second Life, in an automatic way, the equivalent of the RL live show that is the theater, the opera or the ballet.
SPECT-ACTORS
I added a participative dimension to Living Picture. Any visitor can participate in the dance. The immersive experience is then strongly emotional. Visitors tell me about it: some are moved to tears, others stay for hours or come back every day, to see again and again a sequence that usually lasts less than ten minutes.
It was also necessary to integrate the scenery into the creation of the show. All the halls of The Carbone Studio are designed to adapt to the events they host. So it was pretty simple. The creative process can then focus on the theme expressed in the video clip, through the dance, the stage design and also the writing.
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