In/Body Performance Collective
2018-2019
Various locations, Portland, OR
intermedia performance collective
In/Body Performance Collective (Jaleesa Johnston, Sophia Wright Emigh, Nanda D’Agostino) married technology and live movement to explore the cyclical nature of simultaneously invoking and healing ancestral trauma through the body. We began developing our first piece at Future Forum, a media education program at Open Signal PDX.
We shared an interest in the body as a site of memory and how generational trauma manifests in hidden ways within our flesh. Our work drew upon dance, performance art, interactive video programming, and participatory installation, to create a charged landscape choreographed for exploration. Our personal histories of generational trauma based in historic events, and group’s heterogeneity (in age, race, sexual orientation/identity, and career stage) made our collaborative relationship particularly rich and productive.
The potential of video and installation to collapse and expand time and space locate In/Body in an interdisciplinary and experimental line of inquiry within the field of performance and movement. Our exploration of trauma, ancestry and cycles occurred through a process that reflects and embraces the unknown. Creating movement that responds to the unpredictable mixing of images through Isadora creative coding software software, the fluidity within the performance mirrored the myriad ways in which we process traumatic events, memories, and lineage, all within daily life through the immediate experience of the body.
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Creative Coding, Video Editing, Projection Design and Installation: Nanda D’Agostino
Performers: Sophia Wright Emigh and Jaleesa Johnston
Film content: Nanda D’Agostino, Sophia Wright Emigh, Jaleesa Johnston
Music: Kirsten Webb
Performance documentation: Brian Foulkes
Performance trailer editing: Sophia Wright Emigh
Thanks to Open Signal PDX and Future Forum
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Tags: Installation, Performance, Projection mapping, Sound / Composition, Embodied research, Ritual / Ceremonial practice, Collaboration, Interdisciplinary research, Public art
Radiate
2018
Open Signal PDX
In our inaugural group show, Radiate (part of the Portland Winter Lights Festival), In/Body inhabited a dynamic video installation of transparent projection scrims and three-dimensional sound. Because of the transparency of the scrims, imagery multiplied across the floor and onto the walls creating an immersive space. Two sets of projections originated from prerecorded loops and live video feeds of the performers and audience in action mixed in real time. Each projection used 13 distinct interactive “scenes” which mixed loops in a unique way to create a range of effects.
Like a tarot deck, different meanings emerge from the shifting combinations of imagery and effects. Combined with the live feeds of the performers and audience, the potential variations are unpredictable and limitless, creating a liminal space where viewers can both reflect on their own experience and on the movements and reenactments of the performers. Although the subject matter is embodied trauma, many viewers reported the dreamlike quality of the space and the seamless integration of the movement left them with a sense of peace.
The film linked below is an 8-minute distillation of multiple filmed 15-minute loops (which were performed 8 times), and reflects the arc of one entire loop.
