Michaela Davies and Lian Loke bring together their practices in art, dance and technology to explore the concept of the distributed body. They are interested in extending traditional Butoh dance into technology-mediated performance, through the use of brainwave sensors and electric muscle stimulation technology.
The concept of the distributed body poses interesting questions. Who is controlling what? Who is dancing? What kinds of agency and bodies are created within this distributed system? The practice of Butoh works with imagery and the transformative body. How this process of image work translates onto two connected bodies—one person wearing a brainwave sensor and the other attached to an electric muscle stimulation device—is the starting point for their investigations.
Research and creative development supported by Critical Path Choreographic Research Centre and the Design Lab