an immersive experimental drama installation made as a research project
Designs
In June 2011 I presented a paper at the Journal of Media Practice Annual Conference in Salford about the influences and design features of Echo.
Here are my presentation slides:-
I introduced the presentation by talking about why I had chosen to make an installation. Avatar was an instance of trying to capture an ever diverse and scattered audience by an immersive experience.
Drawing attention to theatre as the museum of the 19th century
The death of cinema may have been greatly exaggerated..
but we are living in a post-cinematic era
where media is pervasive, exciting
and naturalised…
How to make the experience important again. Perhaps this is my narcissistic fantasy?
However, the problem with hypermedia is that fantasy and reality are mingled…Zizek described this in his book – Welcome to the Desert of the Real, 2001
This was the background to making Echo. The illustration is Waterhouse – Echo and Narcissus, 1903.
A still from the film showing the visual influence of Waterhouse, but also illustrating the theme of Narcissism.
This illustration is by Dali – Metamorphosis of Narcissus, 1937, and I liked the dark quality of the image.
The main features of Echo
A very strong influence – Bill Viola’s (National Gallery) Overwhelming
,,,my first idea. However, this changed a lot when I realised I needed more context.
A story and a multi-screen drama evolved.
Or was this a remediation of theatre again? 16th Cenury style
Here’s an illustration of the way in which this surround staging might work
as a mini temple
with screens at front top and rear
or in a more modern setting
Intelligibility would be kept through having a narrator link the sequences
Influenced by John Adams Hindsight, staging Orpheus myth
In Echo, the Gods could manipulate the humans from above, as in Jason and the Argonauts
As in Orphee, a sense of landscape/seaside could create myth.
Here is the storyboard
and here is a still captured from the film
and another…
Mike Figgis’s Timecode, uses a looser sense of synchronised sound and is intended to be seen on a flat screen, unlike Echo, which is a surround experience.
