highlike

sound cloud
London-based designer kazuhiro yamanaka has created the ‘sound cloud’ a light-emitting quantum glass speaker system installation for saazs ‘a glass house’ program. the structure is composed of five interactive monolithic glass panels, formed with the intention of modelling the integration of innovative glass within architecture and design. the sound and light radiating from ‘sound cloud’ shift in unison, their synchronization may be altered by the viewer as they adjust their aural and visual experience by means of a touch-screen controller.
yamanaka aspired for the visitors to ‘be able to hear the sound move from one to another, jumping back and forth and echoing from the panels.’
a sound module is attached to each panel. as it vibrates,the three layers of glass move at a frequency, which creates optimum sound quality. the sound for the installation was developed by the france-based sound designer, gling-glang. yamanaka and gling-glang devised a soundscape by which ‘sound cloud’ visitors were able to sense the sculptural construction of the music in walking through the installation’s glass-paneled pathway.
the glass is outfitted with a light-emitting system known as ‘LED in glass’, invented by quantum glass. through this technology, the panels become a source of light. the ‘sound cloud’ is illuminated as the LED bars are fitted around the edge of the panel in order to direct beams of light through the edge of the extra clear glass sheet. as a result, light refraction occurs from the front side by means of a white enamel screen print on the opposite side.
yamanaka chose to slightly obscure the brightness of the glass sound system by creating a thin layer from millions of light dots, culminating in a cloud-like shape.

True/False
True/False is a kinetic sculpture composed of arrays of circular black metal segments set in mechanical columns. Interlocking and rotating around fluorescent light tubes, the cylinders cover or expose the light to display an endless number of patterns. The transformation of the sculpture is based on the shifting elements and their correlation to each other. As the segments do not move independently, for any of the cylinders on a column to change, the segments affected must work in unison to achieve the command. Reminiscent of devices originally used for calculations, such as Turing machines, the sound originates from the mechanical movement of the moving parts thus making the algorithm audible. The rhythm of »true/false« is captivating as variations in the visual choreography result in distinctive changes in its soundscape. Through the generation of algorithmic patterns and the repetition of endless tasks, »true/false« transforms itself into something more than the sum of its elements to reveal the beauty hidden within a basic algorithm.

6&8
In 6, his six dancers move in dynamic and hypnotising unison, in a shifting landscape of light created by Swedish lighting designer Ellen Ruge. His latest work 7 continues Tao Ye’s fascination with pattern, precision and ritual, and is distinguished by a sound track of acoustic effects generated by the seven dancers’ own bodies. Both 6 & 7 will be accompanied by specially commissioned music from Chinese indie folk composer Xiao He.

4&5
Tao Ye likes to designate his dances by number rather than name. After 4 comes 5, his latest to appear in the US: the 27-year-old choreographer behind Beijing’s six-member Tao Dance Theater is just getting started. And yet he is already a worldwide festival favourite and distinctive to boot, in spite of – or perhaps because of – his deliberately limited means. From 2012, 4 restricted itself to four dancers moving in unison and in a tight cohort within the square of the stage. The dancers’ faces were blacked out, their gaze down, their spines never succumbing to the easy beauty of uprightness, and their voluminous costumes, full of folds and creases, were identical.

THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER
THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER will be a work that tries to reveal the person behind the dancer. To reach this, a very complex, mathematical, dynamic and tiring choreography is constructed, which is performed almost completely in unison. The difficulty degree of the choreography is so high, that the dancers eventually will go wrong. It is there where the mask falls. The dancer is defined as an idle and purely executing species, striving for perfection.

rocking chairs
Strijbos & Van Rijswijk invite you to sit back, relax and enjoy making music in a one-of-a-kind sonic rocking chair, where physical movement diffuses and modifies sound emanating from specially developed sensorpack and loudspeaker technology. Swaying back and forth produces an interactive, personalized performance where the compositions you hear are directly shaped by your individual movements and ability to coordinate and work in unison with your fellow rockers.

MENSKE

Even the standing room only tickets have sold out, and the raging mass of disappointed kids looks like they may start a riot: the atmosphere before Ultima Vez’s performance is akin to a rock concert. Choreographer superstar Wim Vandekeybus’s company has toured the world with their trademark vocabulary of acrobatic, extreme, often violent movement, soaked in multimedia and energetic music. Menske (meaning approximately ‘little human’), their latest work, has all the typical flaws and qualities of classic Vandekeybus. On the conservative end of political intervention, Menske is an explosive concoction of brash statements about the state of the world today, a sequence of rapidly revolving scenes of conflicting logic: intimist, blockbuster, desperate, hysterical. The broad impression is not so much of a sociological portrait, but of a very personal anguish being exorcised right in front of us, as if Vandekeybus is constantly switching format in search of eloquence. Visually, it is stunning, filmic: a slum society falling apart through guerrilla warfare, in which girls handily assume the role of living, moving weapons. A woman descends into madness in an oneiric hospital, led by a costumed and masked group sharpening knives in rhythmic unison. A traumatised figure wanders the city ruins dictating a lamenting letter to invisible ‘Pablo.’ Men hoist a woman on a pole her whole body flapping like a flag. “It’s too much!” intrudes a stage hand, “Too much smoke, too much noise, too much everything!” And the scene responsively changes to a quiet soliloquy. At which point, however, does pure mimesis become complicit with the physical and psychological violence it strives to condemn? Unable to find its way out of visual shock, Menske never resolves into anything more than a loud admission of powerlessness.