AGILES

• renaming

We started this week by deciding to call our project the shortened version – ‘Agiles’ rather than ‘Agile Mobilities.’ Agiles suggests a multitude of flexibilities, quick pivots and and expanded capabilities. ‘Mobilities’ applied to this project may bring into question our capacity for movement.  Whilst we are interested in extending our capacities to move we feel that to approach this challenge creatively we should not be confined by strict goals and aims.

Agile  is an artistic research project investigating virtual reality and augmented reality applications for mobility, balance, creativity and connecting with the joy of dancing.

• the team

This project was instigated from discussions between myself  Eva Sifis, who has an acquired brain injury, the Assemblage Centre for Creative Arts team and A/Prof Belinda Lange who is Clinical Lead for Assistive Technologies in the Medical Device Research Institute and a researcher  in the Caring Futures Institute in the College of Nursing and Health Sciences at Flinders University. Further support is from The University of South Australia|IVE| Creative and Arts SA.

I create work by bring together creative collaborators and then motivating creative process. Joining this project is long term collaborator Alex Degaris(Glasshouse, Evocation) who is a wiz unity developer and exceptional visual artist. Supported by an Arts SA grant world renown writer | calligrapher, graffiti  and visual  artist KAB101 and electronic music composer Matthew Thomas.

What brings this group together is an appreciation of the times we spent together in our youth as activators and cultural leaders in the  Adelaide dance music scene. (Alex is the exception – he was born in the 90’s but so far he seems to be keeping up with the pace).

This project begins with Eva.

I danced around the edges, Eva on the podium.

Eva danced on roller skates.

To techno music,

Amongst lazor light shows shone through smoke machines.

Back then Eva was Amazing.

Now she is Amazing!

Eva has an acquired brain injury, and she struggles with some aspects of her mobility.  Climbing stairs can be challenging and balance on uneven ground can be unstable. Eva is curious how we might use VR and AR to increase her mobility and balance through our shared love of dance. Since 2020 we have been talking about how the virtual reality dance works I have been creating might not only assist Eva to work on her mobility and balance and just as importantly might assist her to reconnect with dance.

My artistic practice has evolved from creating performance works for the stage to creating embodied experiences that put the participants in the creator’s seat. I have moved from working with live improvised performance with performance professionals to creating immersive digital experiences with arts professionals for the direct enjoyment of participants.

Begin

So the process begins with dancing/ painting.

We met at the Creative Computing Studio at UniSA and asked KAB101 how he moves. Eva joined his dance.

Alex, Matt and I shared our past work with KAB101 and Eva.

At Flinders – The Void we asked – What type music moves us and found a rhythm in Drum and Base inspired sounds.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Usqwy2-E4SE

We considered the shape of KAB101’s designs and improvised with the visual provocation. We Danced.

The week ended by capturing data from KAB101’s process.

 

Thank you to the extraordinary  Michele Saint-Yves who shared knowledge on neuroscience and lived experience as an artist with a brain injury.

• Eva reflects on the week

The past week saw me fly to Adelaide in order to be present and support my family as Mum underwent major surgery. 
 
Being there unexpectedly gave access to a project previously arranged for me to attend in a remote manner. Incidentally, it asked me to open the pages of a book rammed closed for a while now. The title of this book is ‘Artistry’ and yet the excitement accompanying this metaphorical action has brought me home. 
 
Following are notes taken on the last of three days meeting with fellow artists and academics. I will try to extend them into sentences that make sense and utilise this flight in a helpful way… 
 
The Void at Flinders University enables a mind blowing technological artistry, yet in its virtual infancy – Optical Motion Capture. Utilising a large number (I failed to note just how many) of specialised cameras positioned about the hangar-like space, feedback is gained from reflective little globes. Velcro to specific points on a form fitting suit worn by a subject, they are used to give life and movement to avatars used in the Virtual Reality or Augmented Reality space – kind of a virtual puppeteer, if you will. 
 
An adjunct to this jaw dropping playground is situated further up the incline of the picturesque hillside campus and comprises of 38 speakers arranged on a skeleton of lightweight metal rigging. Described as ‘Dolby Surround Sound on Steroids’, experiencing the full swathe of this tumult will have to wait until part 2 in a month as the programmer was off campus. 
 
As mentioned before, this palette of seriously intelligent imagination is yet in the beginning stages and ‘Endless possibilities of marrying the two spaces and their capabilities’ are latent.  We were told that instead of being operated by a sound designer it’s a system that, according to the algorithm used, births 360 degrees of sound potential. 
Our creativity ran wild with thoughts of the making of Haptic suits that could give ability for translated sensations to be felt by the body. Screw Dolby Surround… the disabled Access potential is out of this world! 
Next asked was where our project might be performed (up the hill or down) being dependent on the technology surrounding it. Technology might use frequencies of sound to motivate different neuro-physical motor mechanics. Also these may stimulate different organs of the body at different frequencies. How might this extend from only hearing sound? With conductivity dissonance, the dopamine hits can only be dreamt, but… damn! 
 
After hearing all that, Scott, (otherwise known as Kab 101) 
“Fuck ‘em, I’m wearing the suit” 
before going on to show us what is truly the beginning of possibility. 
 
Hats off Sarah Neville, Matt and Alex and the rest of the clued up team. 
 
Sent from my iPhone