ABOUT MARK PARRY...

A freelance director and producer working across a range of areas including broadcast factual, drama, dance film and cross-arts projects (solo and collaborative works). Recent projects include light and video installations as part of a touring show/installation with Volcano Theatre Co in 3 outdoor, purpose built environments; “Seascape”, a light and projection piece commissioned for the Govan Gathering Light exhibition/event in Glasgow. He produced a number of Digital Shorts for UK Film Council and South West Screen and was responsible for project managing a dance/film initiative for South West Screen, producing associated dance films (including “Rapid Eye Movement” by Thomas Hall & Kyra Norman) and devising a series of dance/film masterclasses. Documentary work includes a number of commissions from broadcasters and national funding bodies, mainly on arts subjects. Other work includes lighting designs in Britain and abroad for leading companies - theatre, site-specific and outdoor events.

A test visualisation is avaliable HERE. Use your mouse to control chorus line of ballet dancers. (You'll need the shockwave plug-in for your browser).

An interactive installation where the viewers actively become part of the work creating the movement of their own chorus line. The viewer enters the space and sees on an adjacent screen an overhead shot of themselves as the lead member of a chorus of dancers (added to the image via a computer). As they move around the space the chorus follow their lead moving in patterns and steps  associated with one of a number of types of dance, including Busby Berkeley, disco mass dances, western line dances, corps de ballet, jazz, bollywood, Cossack, synchronised swimming. Because the screen, that the audience moves in front of and interacts with, shows an overhead view we can see the shapes and routines of the different types of movement clearly and graphically defined. The viewer becomes the creator of their own mass dance routine in a new take on the “Busby Berkeley Topshot”

The active participant can create flowing movement and patterns that can be observed by an audience around the space. As other viewers enter the space they assume the lead of a different type of chorus or formation. The participants then not only interact with the screen but also each other. So, for example, the Busby Berkeley chorus would have to start sharing the space with a formation of line dancers creating interesting clashes or confluences as the different lines or parts of the chorus meet. As the different “chorus leaders” move around the space their awareness or not of each other’s formations can create unpredicted and unique patterns as the individual dancers avoid or collide with each other.

The performers of the chorus would be manipulated images of real people as opposed to computer generated. The sound would be dynamically constructed using musical motifs relative to each of the dance styles.  For example a chorus line of tap dancers would create a rhythm with their shoes; if a chorus line of bollywood dancers joined them they might add a motif of voice as another layer, creating a musical fusion. Using multiple vocal and footwork sounds to create full but simple layers allows for a changing but not jarring  soundtrack as different “chorus leaders/participants” and their choruses interact with each other. The interjection of another type of dance would result in a musical and choreographic counterpoint.

Technical- presentation of the work: There would be a clearly defined floor performance area of approx 6m x 4.5m with an adjacent screen. A camera overhead would capture and track the viewer’s movement position and speed. Their image would then be fed to the screen as one layer of the screen image. Single chorus dancers would be multiplied and added as another layer by a computer which moves them around with pre-determined stylised steps according to the movement of the viewer. Exhibition would be adaptable to many different types of space including venues and cinemas. Images from the screen could be fed to other locations around a building.

Production of the work: Each performer (cossack, ballet etc) would be shot from above on a plain floor doing a set number of stylistically identifiable moves. The backgrounds would be removed by compositing. A computer programmer would then define the algorithms of the movement patterns for each multiple of the performer, creating rules which make changes in the chorus line movement according to whatever the movement of the viewer might be around the space.