In 2007, I had six different performances in a project I called “D-Cinema Dualities”, using the, at the time, newly installed digital projector at the Norwegian Film Institute in Oslo.
This was a live or realtime project containing sequenced stills, time-lapse loops and multichannel sound presented in the Digital Film standard format, 2K.
Some impressions from the project:
Camera credits: 2006 - Geir W. Røer, 2007 - Sullivan Lloyd Nordrum, 2008 - Robert Hansen. Photo below 2007 by Bjørn Rørslett
In the wake of digital distribution and projection of cinema film, new possibilities emerge for artists to intervene in a room that has, over the decades, been designed and developed to give the optimal experience of projected images and electro-acoustic sound
The arenas this evolving technology will open up is a matter of much speculation. On a winters day in Tromsø, one of Norway’s northernmost cities, a live transmission of a performance at the Metropolitan Opera in New York was projected in more or less realtime at a local cinema. This conjures up wonderful images.
Others see possibilities in communal large-screen computer gaming and also Bingo, I have been told.
This project can be seen as an improvised, “free-form” cinematic experience. A presentation that crosses and mixes boundaries of sound, pictorial and performance art. In the shows I presented possible changes or development in images that in traditional photographic terms would be frozen images, usually presented hanging on a wall. Accentuating or hinting at stories. Coded content one may not easily read off a still image.
In the cinema hall, I usually situate myself close to the front row (about row three or four) with a MIDI-controller, only lit up by the computer screen.
Each sequence has poetic intent in theme and presentation and lasts on average 5-8 minutes. All decisions in the linearity of the presentation are made there and then, influenced by the situation and the audience.
This feels strangely un-photographic in a way. Although I use cameras for all my imagery, I rarely draw or create it in the computer. Here the visuals are presented as a succession of decisive moments instead of one perfect one, frozen for eternity.
Some of my first public steps were made as an actor at the Scene 7 theatre (1970-75). An experimental theatre at the long closed, but at the time, quite influential, Club 7 in Oslo. I feel somehow I am returning, or fulfilling a cycle in this project. Again having to use presence and body.
After the presentations there were artist talks with the audience and experience shared and gained.
Posters for the 6 events :
