Using moving lights which can track and intelligently respond to the dancers, Pattern Recognition opens up questions about learning and memory in relation to the technology of artificial intelligence.
In this visually arresting new work choreographer Alexander Whitley (2015 Critics’ Circle National Dance Award nominee) and digital artist Memo Akten (Prix Ars Electronica Golden Nica winner) join forces at the cutting edge of dance and motion-responsive technology.
Commissioned by Sadler’s Wells and co-commissioned by DanceEast.
Key Information
When
Thursday 3 November 2016 & Friday 4 November 2016
Where
DanceXchange, The Patrick Studio, Birmingham Hippodrome
“Exploring the interaction of human movement and the digital world is certainly nothing new but – in Pattern Recognition – Whitley is mining a largely untapped seam of ideas, establishing and exploring his concept of digitally built dance.”
“The work is a duet, here starring the excellent David Ledger and Julia Sanz Fernández, though it’s perhaps more apt to call it a trio since the lighting quickly emerges as a player in its own right, strobing and flickering in sync with the dancers, who frequently rearrange the lamps’ positioning and on a few occasions step aside so the technology’s ‘performance’ can take centre stage. The lights even take a bow at the end, demurely casting their bulbs downwards following the dancers’ own bow. It’s an engaging effect, helped along enormously by Whitley’s elegant choreography and the excellent chemistry of the dancers.”
Pattern Recognition features a score by critically acclaimed electronic composer Scanner and Southbank Centre artist-in-residence cellist Oliver Coates.