Body Navigation (8 min. trailer) from ole kristensen on Vimeo.
Body navigation is a reactive floor-projection where dancers can dance on together with a digital reproduction of themselves. It consist of a camera tracking the dancers on the floor, and a projector that creates a image on the floor around and on the dancers. With this system connections and visual images about human relations and emotions are created that where not otherwise possible. Jonas Jongejan, from Copenhagen, developed the application which uses Processing.
French company Au Cul du Loup create stunning physical and musical theatre that defies description in Score. As soon as they step on stage, the six performers take the audience on a brilliantly humorous and enchanting journey through the world of competitive sports – from whistling skiers to buzzing tennis players, sticky-taped wrestlers to arrogant jockeys. Just as at the Olympic Games, expect a lot of drama!
Entity, Wayne McGregor and Random Dance, provided a hot rush to counter the city’s chill on the opening week of the Belfast Festival. Together with the music of Joby Talbot, of the Divine Comedy fame, we left feeling like we’d had a hard night dancing ourselves, without the exhaustion, sweat and connections made with new folk on the dance floor.
In fact the shrouded string quartet and electronic soundscape set a haunting tone for the otherworldly visuals which really did separate audience from performer. The dancers’ extreme moves evoked voyeuristic feelings in me, their hot contortionist bodies pulling moves reminiscent of spasticity. It is the taboos around watching people who move outside of the norm that made it all the more compelling.
The awesome strength and endurance of the dancers allowed them to dance on the knuckles of their feet - that’s a big ouch that I’ve experienced thanks to yoga teacher Idit’s (from Samadhi yoga in Newtown) toe torture pose which she justifies as a tool for pain management.