Echo/Locate

Photography by Mark Sugino

Echo/Locate

Length: 8 minutes; Number of Dancers: 11; Projection Design by Richard Jones

Echo/Locate is a multimedia dance-work exploring the sensory experience of the body in motion. This work was commissioned by the Vassar Repertory Dance Theater to premiere as part of Vassar College's annual Modfest arts festival. In keeping with the 2018 festival theme, 'adapting', the piece was created in connection with a second Modfest event, Animals, Adapting: a series of ecological projections exploring the mutability of nature as a constant. Echo/Locate takes inspiration from bats' ability to navigate their surroundings using sound rather than sight, an adaption known as echolocation. Correspondingly, the work explores how the dancing body employs alternative sensory experiences such as proprioception to understand its orientation in space and to navigate through complex environments. In order to remain connected to the animal of inspiration, layered images are projected throughout the piece. A luminous moon, fluttering insects, and bats in flight reference facets of the animal's experience, while forming connections with the moving bodies of the dancers on stage.

Performance History

Vassar College | Poughkeepsie, NY | February 2018

Press

http://info.vassar.edu/news/announcements/2017-2018/171206-modfest-2018.html