My dance film Floating Departures, will be screened in Chicago on Wednesday, June 22nd as part of the International Conference on Movement and Computing (MOCO). A behind the scenes documentary where we describe our process will also be screened following the film.
The screening takes place at the Dance Center 1306 S Michigan Ave. from 5:00-9:00pm along with many other dance and technology works. For more information on the program of events see: https://moco22.movementcomputing.org/about.html
Virtual and in-person registration is available for the conference: https://moco22.movementcomputing.org/attend.html To see any of the practice works in-person please register for ‘Regular In-Person’ and use the promo code MOCOART at checkout ($25 USD).
Unfortunately I will not there in person, but am hoping to connect with attendees on Discord!
Screen capture from Floating Departures (2021) film by Shannon Cuykendall and Steve DiPaola in collaboration with Alexandra Pickrell and Roya Pishvaei. This frame features performer Roya Pishvaei.
Please also see our paper that will be published in conjunction with the screening: “Floating Departures: Developing Quarantine Dance Technique as an Artistic Practice Beyond the Pandemic”
Abstract: We describe our process of quarantine dance technique in making the dance film and meditation, Floating Departures. This work, created during lockdown in 2021, brings together dance movement, poetry, painterly styles, and sound to explore cyclical patterns and points of departure in movement and life. To create Floating Departures we used a broad range of technologies–from everyday objects to smartphones to AI art systems. We experiment with various techniques to record ourselves and bring our movement together in a shared digital space with post-production video editing techniques. Using a bricolage approach, we incorporate materials, such as bubble wrap and balloons, to transform our spaces and explore our personal experiences during lockdown. We construct multiple layers of reality that are further transformed in unanticipated directions with AI technologies. Through our creation process, we develop a collective physical body to explore a new realm, unbound by reason or logic, that was only made possible through our remote collaborative processes and technologically-mediated interactions.
Shannon Cuykendall 