The Dancer as Coder: Live Coding in Telematic Dance With Sensors - Iannis Zannos (ICLC2024)
Paper presentation in Paper Session 2 of the International Conference on Live Coding 2024 at NYU Shanghai - June 1, 2024.
Full Program: https://iclc.toplap.org/2024/program.html
The Dancer as Coder: Live Coding in Telematic Dance With Sensors
This paper presents the results of work embodied performance with dances using sensor combined with live coding in telematic dance performances and discusses it in the context of recent performances realized between Greece and Japan. It presents sc-hacks-redux, a SuperCollider library that enables live coding of the sound vocabulary as well as the interaction mode between dancers and sound producing algorithms, through the broadcasting sensor data as well as code using the open-source software OscGroups. The paper focusses on collaborative aspects, and on the interaction between data and code in the creation process. While coding on the keyboard radically differs from dancing as computer interaction modality, it can be argued that the live combination of recorded movement data with code opens new possibilities to interpret dance movement as a complement to code. Recorded movement data take the place of code in capturing reproducible aspects of performance, and in this way bring dancers closer to coding. We describe different strategies used to create performances, and the role of dancers/choreographers vs coders in the design process. Finally we discuss tools created to help dancers themselves to select sounds, refine interaction parameters and rehearse while independently running the library on their own computer during networked rehearsals.
Iannis Zannos
Iannis Zannos has a background in music composition, ethnomusicology and interactive performance. He has worked as Director of the Music Technology and Documentation section at the Federal for Music Research (SIM-PK, Berlin), and Research Director at the Center for Research for Electronic Art Technology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He teaches audio and interactive media arts at the Department of Audiovisual Arts of the Ionian University, Corfu. Publications include: "Ichos und Makam" and "Music and Signs". Participation in artistic collaborations include programming of interactive sound for Eric Sleichim / Bl!ndman Quartet, and Ulrike and David Gabriel (2000); Cosmos-X - Multimedia installation with multiple audio and video projections based on the work of Iannis Xenakis, with Efi Xirou (2005-2006); and several installations with Jean-Pierre Hébert (2004-2011) He performs regularly using live coding techniques with SuperCollider. Further collaborations and project include collaborations, Iannis Chrysides, 2014, and presentations at Athens Biennale (2016). Since 2018 he focusses on telematic dance performance with a series of works between Greece, Japan and other countries, and collaborations with other composers and dancers.