UKIYO [moveable worlds]

UKIYO is a choreographic installation fusing dance, sound, design and digital projections, created by DAP Lab and directed by Johannes Birringer, with Michèle Danjoux.

"Ukiyo", now in its third installment, explores the layers of perceptions in an audiovisual world that constantly shifts and fragments. The audience is invited to move in and around the space which features five hanamichi (runways) and several projection screens for the virtual world graphics and animated photography. The dancers and musicians perform simultaneously with digital objects that mutate. Live sound, music and visual choreography for "Ukiyo" are designed for real-time gestural interaction to animate feedback and generative processes through which virtual space and physical performer movements are intertwined.



A European-Japanese collaboration directed by Johannes Birringer, "Ukiyo" is a theatrical installation featuring audiophonic design concepts and wearables by Michèle Danjoux, and choreography by Katsura Isobe, Helenna Ren, Anne-Laure Misme, Yiorgos Bakalos, and Olu Taiwo; choreography on screen by Biyo Kikuchi, Yumi Sagara, Jun Makime, Ruby Rumiko Bessho and Mamen Rivera. Original music composed by Oded Ben-Tal, with live digital sound and sensor processing by Sandy Finlayson. Live music composed and performed by Caroline Wilkins. Photography, video and 3D digital designs by Paul Verity Smith, Doros Polydorou and Johannes Birringer; scenography & lighting by Johannes Birringer. The Second Life graphical interface is designed by Takeshi Kabata and Yukihito Obara. Additional engineering by Eng Tat Khoo (Keio-NUS CUTE Mixed Reality Lab).


This performance by an international ensemble of artists from the London-based DAP-Lab was developed in collaboration with butoh dancers and digital artists in Tokyo, Japan, as part of cross-cultural research into virtual environments( directed by Birringer, director of DAP-Lab, and Center for Digital Performance, Brunel University, School of Arts and coordinated in Japan by Yukihiko Yoshida , Keio University Tokyo).



The European première of UKIYO took place in June 2010 at KIBLA Media Art Center, Maribor, Slovenia. This project is supported by a grant from The Japan Foundation and The Centre for Contemporary and Digital Performance at Brunel University, West London.


Dap-lab/dsj
www.danssansjoux.org