Introduction

As humans we possess the unique ability to perceive "bimodally" (Hanna, 1994). We can perceive at a distance - objectively and theoretically, in the third person - or, in an embodied way - subjectively and experientially, in the first person. Traditionally science and art expressed reality in this polarity: science as the logical measurer and art as the intuitive interpreter. In representing the human body and human movement, science has captured the raw, mechanical data, while art has captured its unique expressiveness.

As we have deepened our knowledge of the complexity of human movement - both theoretically and experientially, a perceptual synthesis is emerging. As technology has become increasingly responsive and interactive, scientists and artists are blending their perspectives to more fully represent human movement. Human-computer interactions are giving us a movable vantage point in which to extend, amplify, and enrich our capacities to think, feel, and move. As we wed technology to our sentient, moving selves, we are improving not only our movement efficiency and effectiveness, but also the aesthetic dimension of our lives.

Since the early 1980's, artists Robb Lovell and John Mitchell have been investigating the interactive potential of the MSS. The intent of these investigations is to render the technology not merely more "sensitive," (more responsive to stimuli), but more sensible, (responding perceptively to aesthetic values). Both Lovell and Mitchell are finding new sense-abilities in the human-performer interface that extend the technology beyond automation and robotics "to affect the very nature of performance" (Lovell, Mitchell, 1993).

What is the "nature" of performance? Performance is transformative. It is a perceptual act of creation, inherently aesthetic because it carries us beyond habitual thought and action (Von Foerster, 1989). Through a kind of kin-aesthetic ontology, performance is an existential act of becoming in which heightened awareness gives rise to an unimpeded and transformed perception of ourselves. The merging of body, space, and time in performance allows us to e-merge with renewed awareness, intelligence, and appreciation.

Intent of the Project

I came to the Institute for Studies in the Arts (ISA) to work with the Movement Sensing System (MSS), (alternately called, the Intelligent Stage (IS) (Lovell & Mitchell, 1993)), to investigate its potential in (re)training dancers to alter inefficient and potentially injurious movement habits. I was particularly intrigued by the "somatic" potential of the MSS. The word "somatic" refers to our experience of ourselves as lived and living entities. "Somatics" is a colloquial term for a body of movement education approaches that evolved from the humanistic (Gestalt) psychology tradition of the 1970's (Hanna, 1994). Somatic movement education follows a cybernetic model - that (motor) learning is self-generated and self-guided by conscious awareness of one's (mainly bodily) perceptions. Based on the belief that efficient action is innately enfolded in the nervous system (Pribram, 1991), somatics offers a richly responsive environment that enables a person to discover or create alternative strategies for improved movement. Focusing largely on interoceptive cues, (enhanced and guided by touch and subtle, gentle movements), these movement education approaches facilitate the "unfolding" or "surfacing" of a new movement template.

While the goals of both the IS and somatics are similar (to improve human perception/performance), the means by which the IS acts somatically differ greatly from traditional movement re-education approaches. Having been in the somatic movement since 1978 (as student and certified practitioner), I wanted to investigate how these means were expressed within the MSS. The IS is a performance space, an enriched environment where moving bodies find their raison d'etre exteroceptively. I was interested in whether exteroceptive cues could be employed as powerfully in movement learning as interoceptive cues are in somatics. It seemed logical to me that the transformative value of performance lay in awareness of the confluence of perceptions - both bodily and environmental.

The current technology of the MSS - despite its embryonic stage of development - shows promise of becoming more "somatic," i.e., more responsive to the moving body in ways that can alter malcoordination and pathomechanical movement. The MSS is designed to be a sensed and sensing environment. As such, it can function somatically, refreshing movement perception and influencing its organization. Because of this heightened interaction, I reasoned that the IS could help dancers improve their movement ability, not only to improve their efficiency to avoid further injury, but to improve their expressivity. My hope was that the IS would provide an atmosphere - a laboratory - in which my two dancer-subjects could explore and develop new strategies for corporeal support. I wanted the MSS to challenge the dancers' psychophysical orientations and predilections. Ideally, the MSS would assist these dancers in alleviating their chronic musculoskeletal problems by illuminating new options for movement other than those bound by the parentheses of habit. Such an outcome cold have significant ramifications not only for dance training in general, but also for movement re-training in the field of rehabilitation medicine.

While the complexity and the constraints of the current MSS tested my capabilities and my patience, and our interactions were not always graceful, we endured. The following summary outlines this process and points the way for future directions of my study. These ideas are far from fleshed out and integrated, but rather serve as a sketch for further study.

The Theoretical Underpinnings

I was particularly excited about the convergence of science and art in this project because I was frustrated by traditional models of movement training, both in dance and in rehabilitation. h of this knowledge has been based on outdated learning models or erroneous applications of quantitative, scientific data.

No doubt, biomechanics, bioengineering, and computer science have provided us with sophisticated models for the observation, description, and recording of the mechanics of human movement. Image recording and processing techniques can digitalize movement three-dimensionally and can fine-tune this qualitative and quantitative data for joint angles, velocities, directional pathways (the descriptive kinematics) and the movement forces (the kinetics). We can locate, clarify, and differentiate a body segment, a phase of movement, or force parameters with incredible accuracy and predictability.

While these values facilitate our analytical computations, however, they are far from sufficient in grasping the fullness of a movement experience. From the point of view of utility, objective data have little direct application to learning movement. A movement described solely by joint angles, separated from its sentient being, is poor indeed as a learning tool. The body in motion does not have a language, as such, but through sensing itself in motion, forges meaning (McFee, 1992; Gendlin, 1992). Such meaning is not always to be related to structural or functional parameters. The body at once takes up measurable space, but, more importantly, has spatialized intentiality, expressed as purpose, energy, desire. The meaning in human movement issues from this embodied, expressive purpose, both implicit and explicit, and from the situational contingencies in the environment in which we act (Bruderlin, 1992; Gendlin, 1992). To paraphrase Heiddiger, the utility of a vessel is not in the material it is made of, but in the space and what it holds.

In the expression the language of the body, the of is not the possessive, but the relational (Applebaum, 1995). While mechanics describes the actual moving body, the virtual moving body is nonlinear and improvisational. People do not live their lives with by specified movement parameters or concentrating on components of movement, but rather, improvising what to do next, in a moment by moment way. Our teaching of movement and our rehabilitation strategies should emulate (at least in part) real life - be contextual, continually changing, virtual.

Despite all we know about pathomechanical movement, clinicians still face enormous challenges in designing effective approaches to movement retraining. We are still operating with old conditioning models of learning which break down a movement pattern into simple components, and then, for simplicity, repeat and reinforce them. Such component-based skill-building that is out-of-synch with real-time events.

Human gait (walking), for example, is a universal pattern of movement that has received much attention. Gait is a universally rhythmic alternating pattern of flexion and extension of the lower extremities. Yet, everyone's walking pattern is unique. We require not only hard-wired responsive to the constraints of the task, environment, and performer (Ulrich, Jensen, Thelen, 1994). While we understand all the elements or components that together give us a gait pattern (such as the components of the "stance" or "swing" phases), teaching these components to a person with a pathological gait does not translate into normal walking. A qualitative and quantitative difference exists between someone who is "walking along" or who is "walking toward" (Bruderlin, 1992).

How the Project Took Shape

Within these 6 weeks, I needed to keep my goals and my vision of this project fluid to accommodate for the emerging technology. It quickly became clear that an outcome could not readily be predicted, deduced, expected, recognized, or preprogrammed. For the first four weeks, Robb Lovell overcame many technological hurdles as he advanced the responsivity and robustness of the computer to track three-dimensional points and relationships in space. His goal (as I understand it) was to compute "gesture," the changing relationship between two or more points on the body, so that location and relationship could be tracked at any point in space. This was a sizable piece of work.

What the MSS does not do at this point is accurately track a movement's directional pathway. Nor can the MSS measure dynamics (neither internal or external forces). Thus, movement "effort" is almost impossible to determine. Rather than try to attempt to replicate or compare the two technologies, I instead attempted to choose a form in which forces could be "felt" or visualized. Ironically, rather than a hindrance, the absence of force recordings freed the dancers from focusing on muscular effort, thus, freeing their bodies to move with greater ease.

As the range of computer manipulations expanded, our ability to explore our ideas did also. The work quickly turned chaotic, with several independent ideas floating about at once. While my lack of experience didn't necessarily prevent me from utilizing the MSS, it certainly impeded my ability to communicate my ideas. However, as I relinquished my need for control as the program took shape, several provocative ideas of exploration emerged by the end of the fourth week.

The Subjects

Two graduate dance students volunteered for this project. Both had chronic lower extremity injuries caused by structural and functional (compensatory) malalignment, and of which they both had a rudimentary understanding. Our work consisted of defining the orthopedic and somatic "causes" of their movement problems and to discover potential solutions. The project consisted of the following:

1. An orthopedic evaluation - an assessment of significant musculoskeletal findings;

2. Videotaping of their pedestrian movement and choreography;

3. One-on-one somatic re-education lessons combining techniques from the Feldenkrais Method and the Alexander Technique to address their individual problems;

4. Group somatic lessons where both could deepen the proprioceptive knowledge by learning from each other's movement problems;

5. Structured improvisations in the MSS, based on the findings from 1, 2, 3, and 4, in what the computer technology could accommodate;

6. Recording and analyzing their gait patterns using the Peak Motion Analysis System for stride length, angular velocity, angular acceleration, and ground reaction forces.

7. Practical sessions on personal approaches to injury prevention and rehabilitation, such as body conditioning, taping, and orthotics; and

8. Ad hoc interviews and feedback sessions.

The orthopedic (musculoskeletal) and kinesiological assessments were significant in the general scheme of their rehabilitation, but were not revealing in terms of this project because of the inability of the MSS to track their joint movement with any degree of accuracy, kinematically or kinetically. Since I had this data from the Peak System (at least from a lateral view), I was satisfied with the preliminary objective data.

Beyond their orthopedic findings, however, both dancers exhibited "somatic" dysfunctions. here, the MSS became a powerful learning tool. Somatic dysfunctions are not medical (Hanna, 1990/91). While psychophysical trauma plays a role in their development, somatic dysfunctions result from perceptual disembodiment, from a skewed sense of self and its orientation in the world. Generally, somatic dysfunctions are characterized by extraneous, unwanted excessive, misdirected, and interfering muscular effort which may result (in the long run) in a medical problem - an injury. Somatic dysfunctions are exhibited as "bad" posture as malcoordination and result from:

1. somatic retraction - distortions of midline organization (shortening the vertical axis, narrowing our shoulders, or flattening our spinal curves) for example; Beyond structural malalignment, these distortions influence the latitude, longitude, and profunditude of the dancers' attitudes toward space and existence;

2. somatic lateralization (the relinquishing of bilateral symmetry) and the habitualization of lop-sided action;

3. somatic globalization - lack of joint range, sequencing, and differentiation (Hanna, 1990/91).

Ironically, somatic dysfunctions generally go unnoticed by a person until there is injury. The person habituates to these compensations quickly and not only feels familiar in their posture and movement (it feels "right"), but also is incapable of correcting the problem. It is as if the person experiences a kind of "sensory-motor amnesia" (Hanna, 1990/91).

Somatic dysfunctions may not show up readily in technique and performance, because the dancer has learned to skillfully mask the difficulties. Execution may show technical flaws, but more importantly the performance lacks ownership and integrity. The dancer is disembodied and cannot fully embrace the moment in space-time. (S)he may show a perceptible difficulty in taking a movement form and holding to it. One can see that psychophysical thoughts and associations interfere with the ability to perform fully, effectively, and expressively (Applebaum, 1995).

In view of the potential of the MSS to alter these somatic dysfunctions, then, my idea was to have these dancers explore an environment in which they could perceive themselves differently and adopt improved strategies for movement. It was my hope that the MSS could facilitate a remapping of the dancers' corporeal reality.

Finding how and where their somatic problems lay came from both my assessments and from their impression of moving in the space of the IS. By their own admission, the MSS offers them and immediacy of both inner and outer sensations, allowing for mutations of their body precepts. In both subjects, somatic dysfunctions were apparent and were expressed as organizational difficulties in finding core support and weight transfer. I wanted to see if and how the dancers could use the MSS to find axial support - a stronger inner reference in relationship to space.

WY suffered from chronic shin splints in both tibias. Her basic somatic dysfunction was one of somatic retraction. She normally did not sense nor act from her central axis, her vertical weight line. She moved as if she was divided at the waist, with her proprioceptive awareness mainly in her lower body and limbs. She needed to come into existence in the vertical dimension; to sense her vertical and project it as a central axis of support throughout her body and into space. Instead, she exploited her flexibility in her lower spine and hip joints to attain certain movements at the expense of attaining and acting from a clear directional vertical.

DH suffered from pain from a previous left knee and ankle injury, and from left lower extremity malalignement. Her posture and movement was strongly influenced by her forward facing visual focus. Her visual sense appeared to supersede her proprioceptive and kinesthetic senses. There were isolated areas of immobility due to increased muscle tension which again appeared to be linked with her visual habits. In direct opposition to WY, DH had a hard time losing her vertical, especially when transferring her weight from side to side, or in orienting her head in other dimensions other than vertical. Her need was to become more kinesthetically and proprioceptively sensitive and to counterbalance this with her strong visual intent. Rather than becoming more projective, as WY needed to do, DH needed to be more sensorily contiguous (McFee, 1992), more "in touch" with herself to find a more mobile central axis of support, rather than being locked into a predominantly visual means of stability.

The Incarnations

There were a number of structured improvisations we explored to give insights into solutions to the somatic dysfunctions. First, I wanted to design a space in which the dancers could begin to perceive a significant difference in the relationships between different body parts. This was achieved primarily by:

A. Placing a differencing trigger in the space (a continuous sound patch) that had "holes" of silence in it, where the dancers would come into a different state of existence when they found the holes; and

B. Exploring 2-point triggers in the space, in which the dancers were challenged in their strategies of finding and repeating sounds triggered at various points in the space. Both environments were designed to emphasize midline awareness of inner central cues relative to the central axis of the body, the midline or vertical.

Other improvisational structures we toyed with included:

1. Extending their axes (and their perceptions of it) by the use of wands, headdresses, arrows, etc.;

2. The use of camera convergence to create virtual "duets;"

3. The use of the overhead camera to create a foreshortened vertical;

4. The use of the flex camera to challenge their vestibular system and take them out of their habitual sense of gravity; and

5. tracking points on their bodies and in space, for position and relationship, and recording the computerized tracing of these points in regular light and in black light;

6. flocking.

Many of these structured improvisations challenged the dancers in ways that still need to be analyzed. Most of the work has been reproduced and can be synthesized at a later date. The dancers each had interesting responses to being in the space. DH loved the black box, as an "intense" performing space, that drew her "more into" herself. She enjoyed having her locomotion constrained by the 5 x 5 foot space of our lab, which brought her into greater intimacy with her moving self.

WY found a better sense of midline organization when the computer tracked her torso while she improvised with the differencing trigger (the sound hole). Here she began to experience a different means of moving from her predilection to always initiate from peripheral points in her body.

The Criteria for Optimal Movement Learning
In evaluating the IS as an effective somatic learning environment, I thought about various criteria for an optimal learning experience, especially in an interactive one rooted in movement. These criteria exist when:

1. sensibilities are heightened. One is enmeshed in a sensory experience where their attention is arrested in a profound way;


2. perceptual boundaries are made more fluid (between the sensory modes-visual, aural, and kinesthetic-and between the mover and space/objects).


3. there is an improvisational atmosphere-freedom to explore without time-based commitments;

4. the atmosphere presents a threshold of difference or novelty (freed from everyday habit in the way)-where both memory (association) and habit are suspended;

5. there are constraints (a tightly designed environment), but there is a window of flexibility and freedom;

6. feedback is provided;

7. the environment allows for a feeling of control;

8. outcomes (desires, beliefs, behaviors, movements) may be either intended or unintended) emerge from real-time interactions;

9. the environment provides not a "task" or "function" as such, but a means of exploration and enjoyment. In a computerized environment, this is dependent partly on the ease of use, the aesthetic potential, and the low error rate (Czikszentmihalyi, 1991).

How is the Intelligent Stage Intelligent?

There is no doubt that when a dancer finds him/herself within the environment of the IS, the performer has a different sense of his/herself that translates into improved performance. The space becomes a convincing, compelling, sensed environment that resonates both extero- and interoceptively. The IS extends many of the criteria for an optimal learning experience by applying them specifically to the moving body as it interacts with technology. These unique elements include:

I. The Black Box - he Topography of Potential

First, the IS is a black box programmed to offer a richly textured experience which facilitates an overwhelming feeling of movement potential. The topography of the space-the intense blackness-blacks out irrelevant sensory messages and other stimuli, thus focusing and demanding a heightened engagement of the senses. The body's aesthetic look or line (often a hazard in dance classes where mirrors predominate) is replaced by the immateriality of field tensions-vital and mechanical energies. Every point in space becomes potentially fluid and interesting. The human-technology interface takes the dancer out of his/her usual (domesticated) self. What becomes possible is what's important. It is as if the brain can set up an "image of achievement" (Pribram, 1991), that the neuromuscular system strives to match. Because of the immediacy to the experience, the dancer is freed to a great extent of her presumptions of how to stand and move. The body-its posture, movement, perceptions-become so responsive to the solicitations of the environment that the movement "just happens." In this way, the environment functions like another means of perceiving, another sense. This particular space was roughly a 5 x 5 foot area where the cameras could track the dancers' movements. This intensified the psychophysical proximity (to the event) and continuity in space-time.

II. Immersion

In the IS, the events are triggered in the space. The IS immerses the dancer into another world in which sensibility is heightened, perception extended, and interactions embedded and enmeshed in such a way that one is face-to-face with existence. Such an environment focuses the dancers' attention in new ways:

a. It frees the attention from habitual ways of perceiving the body in motion;

b. It increases the intensity of exteroceptive focus and receptivity;

c. It ritualizes the experience so that an aesthetic arises from the interactions;

d. It enhances presence, the felt quality of being both here-and-there simultaneously;
such as being and moving in the monitor, in oneself, and in the space at the space time;

e. It frees one from associations, from "retrospective attachments to time to prospective ones; one can move through space-time without the crutch of (movement) memory. This is transformative in that it leaves one committed to living an ongoing actuality, not a series of recollections. (Stafford, 421);

f. information "comes" to the dancer, surfaces in a bodily way, "just like that" (Gendlin, 1991), by apprehending in the moment.

Immersion gives the dancer an experience "telepresence," a heightened way of perceiving the moving self in the changing space. Here time doesn't pass, but events (what is in time) pass. There is a sense of "connected nowness" which somatically, has structural, functional, and energetic implications for movement organization. The dancer moves beyond a sense of "kinesthesis," (somewhat disputed as a true of thorough bodily "sense" already) (McFee, 1992; Gendlin, 1991), toward "coenesthesis," a feeling of the whole bodily presence, composed of all the vital impressions that extend its boundaries (Applebaum, 1995, p. 100).

At the same time, the IS illuminates not where you are, but where you potentially are. The IS provides inklings of movements not yet realized in the physical world, but possibly realized, freeing the dancers to create new strategies for movement.

The result of two interacting temporal notions-sequence and simultaneity-resolves this paradox. As Stafford notes: "The voyager (the dancer), by the work of exploration reconciles in (her) body the experience of sequence with that of simultaneity. Long-standing phenomena 'rushing' or 'bursting' in to overwhelm (her) consciousness, physically blend their moment with (hers)." The rapidity with which the environment changes at once brings the body into a state of conscious existence and, at the same time, points the way toward another potential dynamic interaction.

III. Immediacy in Real-Time Recording

Experience in three-dimensional, real-time experience allows events to occur with ample time to not crimp them. Here, one does not move so much as to move one's point of view. The moving body becomes a "thoroughfare," for knowledge, where knowledge moves through space and time (Stafford, 1985). This experience doesn't necessarily accelerate time, but accelerates the rate of change of events, demanding the utmost in fluid attendance.

The tight linkage between visual, kinesthetic, and aural modalities is one key to this experience. Such close coupling invites a new phenomenology of presence (Costa, 1991). The out-thereness of the experience appears to give the dancer a moment of more than one body, one organization, and one world. This glimpse of oneself in another dimension is transformative; raw data becomes movement, right before one's eyes. The dancers sense all these cues, and the movement of one's exteroceptive organs while the body moves, within the context of changing events within the environment, liberates the body to do the undoable. Limitations can be overcome by contacting the body in the space, in the moment.

Further, the experience in real-time is not about thinking. Events are not mobilized by concepts, but by energy of the mover in the space. The experience mobilizes one's energy-mental, muscular, affective, and experiencing this energy without the constraints of thought (Costa, 1991). As movements are captured in real-time, their form, fluidity, expression, and spontaneity take precedent over analysis. Such an experience "arrests the intellectualizing tendencies of the mind," and alters the concept of time (Applebaum, 1995, p. 85). Aesthetics philosopher
David Applebaum notes:

"Time is ordinarily understood through succession (one event follows another), direction (movement from past to future), insufficiency (never enough time) and extraneousness (being outside of and containing events). When (habitually experienced) time comes to a stop, one experiences not timelessness, but time unqualified by intellectÉEvents are linked by nonlinear relationships rather than by successionÉTime ceases to exist apart from what takes place; instead, it becomes a quality specific to that event." (Applebaum, 1995, p. 85, parentheses added.)

IV. Simultaneous Co-oining of Attention of the Mover with the Environment


In terms of relationships, the IS's open-endedness empowers the individual to connect with self and others (or other things) in a new way. There is a freeing and a blurring of boundaries between self-self, self-space, self-others. The experience, however, takes "work." It is not characterized by easy self-expression, the drift of reverie, or passive reflection. Instead, one perceives directly, as a gestalt (Pribram, 1991). Perception is coupled to action in a way that the artist must make active, rapid choices to respond to shifting events. Because one perceives directly, actively, and keenly, the artist must shift from the production of movement (for the sake of shape, etc.) to the creation of systems for communication. This is a very significant shift. It is a shift away from "technique" or "style" toward more authentic movement.

V. Somatic Difference

The purpose of this work is to bring being while moving into the foreground, to register a recognizable difference in perception which brings existence into bas relief. Thresholds of existence come from perceptual novelty - the just noticeable difference, just distinguishable, barely visible or noticeable environmental/energy level change. Once senses not merely a difference, but a difference that "makes sense" of the context of the moving whole. This happens quite automatically in the IS because the space is not exactly a seamless likeness - an illusion of the actual presence is not due to accurate representation. Unlike a mirror, it is not mimetic, but the fact that it is at once real-time recorded but out of synch with one's true perceptions renders it aesthetic. The IS (by remote-control technology) is capable of visually and aurally joining physically distinct spaces and taking one out of the habitual realm of gravity.

Present Constrains and Future Directions

Now that the project has come to an end, I have even more questions than when I began. To what extent does the IS influence or determine movement? Does the immersive experience actually improve the dancer's performance, or does it "engineer" an appropriate response, and serve as another form of conditioning? If we define learning not simply as novelty and differentiation, but novelty makes a difference, how predictive an environment is it? Once aesthetic/movement choices are made, is it difficult to maintain their freshness? Can we utilize the environment in ways that can at once provide an improvisational platform for movement discovery and, at the same time, be a replicable and reinforcing system of movement learning? Many questions remain here. I leave this project with a deep sense of gratitude for this opportunity. The entire experience has been a mythic oddesy, from landing the first day in the midst of the Superbowl, to the suspended time spent in the blackest of holes in the IS. I have learned much, and hope that it has illuminated a better pathway for others. If I were to do it all over again, I would choreograph a piece based on my ideas of somatic learning. Before concluding, however, I wish to speak to some of the frustrations I experienced in the project:

I cannot speak to the nature of the technological shortcomings we all experienced during the first four weeks of the project. Suffice to say that they significantly hindered our progress, rendering our interactions tenuous and fragile. Much time was spent in trying to set up a running program, one that would adapt to a wide range of varying conditions and handle ambiguity, inaccuracies, and errors. We were also limited by the number, technical "strength," and position of lights, monitors and amplifiers.

Beyond the mechanical constrains, however, the more difficult problems surfaced in the nature of its use"

A fine line exists between invention and discovery. Ideally, in an experimental laboratory, discovery always takes precedence over invention, the latter often being tethered to time-based goals. We can easily forge "truths" because we need an immediate answer. My idea was not so much to "tailor" the effects but to render the human-technology interface more responsive to the somatic variables.

At present, the MSS is commissioned mainly to produce works than to function as a laboratory of experimentation. A performance-driven environment supersedes the experiential necessity of free and open experimentation necessary for discovery. I often felt (tacitly, indirectly and ambiguously) pushed to come up with concrete tasks that had specific outcomes and often felt uneasy about not being able to explore an idea for the length of time or in the manner I would have liked to have done. It's not that being product-based is wrong, but this needs to be explicitly stated from the outset, so that the artist will understand that their process will be intricately bound to product.

To explore complexity, an open-ended atmosphere must prevail. An artist/scientist must have the freedom to fail, to say, "this doesn't work," and to throw it out and build anew. Form follows failure, not time-driven function. Rather than see the polished fruits of my thought, I need to expose the pits, seeds and cores of my thinking. When predictability prevails, we at best have entertainment and at worst an atmosphere of opportunism that kills the artistic spirit. First, while not necessarily deliberate, it is ultimately a rejection of the collaborative process. Second, it forces the artist to become opportunistic in gathering knowledge as well, which kills the spirit of inquiry. It forces the artist to mobilize resources before they are developmentally ready. It struck a primitive cord in me, almost like the memory of being a child being forced to walk and be mature before being developmentally ready.

Bodily learning, especially, requires sensitivity and time. Ideally, I needed time to simply investigate, not push answers, grasp at straws, produce a visible product. Improvement would not result from these determinants, but from observing the complex circumstances as they arose, having time to reflect on them, play with the elements, integrate the knowledge. I needed to creatively appropriate the space, which I could not do under the circumstances.
Finally, there were the scheduling and knowledge-based problems:

1. Overly-committed personnel

Robb Lovell and John Mitchell are two very gifted individuals, but they are only two people. John was barely available for my project, and both men were committed to producing for other projects, which raised my level of anxiety in taking their time. More people need to be trained to do such collaborative projects, or, those who come to work with them need a much higher level of technical expertise to cut through the misunderstandings, miscommunications, and to help set up the system.

2. Truncated time period for the grant

Six weeks is way too short, which is what everyone expected, especially under these circumstances.

3. Knowledge base

It is not that the artist cannot utilize the technology without a good knowledge base of its capabilities, but such knowledge would facilitate a closer match between personnel which would save time and enhance communication. I came in virtually blind. I would like to bet much better informed on all levels before engaging in such a project again, especially one with these time constraints.

4. Inadequate orientation

When the artist is as little versed in computer language as I am, it would be wonderful to have a more relevant and thorough orientation session. What really made Robb and I begin to understand each other was when someone came to interview us for the press. By a third party asking questions, it became clear to each of us what we were really wanting to accomplish, and what were our concerns, constraints and goals. Since the ISA has been conducting research in movement sensing for so long, it would be extremely worthwhile to have a video outlining this history - the mechanisms behind the stunning performances. To read about it is one thing (as outlined in their paper), but to hear and see them speak is quite another.

Postscript

I extend my deepest thanks to Dr. Philip Martin and Todd Royer of Exercise and Sports Science who allowed me to collect data in their lab; to Linda Dennis for her cheerful and helpful assistance; to Patricia Clark and her assistants for always making time and space for me under harried conditions; to Richard Loveless and all the people at the Institute who believed in this project. Finally, I especially want to thank Robb Lovell whose patient and persistent "What do you want to do today, Glenna?" kept me going in the darkest of moments.

References

1. Applebaum D (1995): The Stop. Peter Lang Press: New York.

2. Badler NI (1989): A computational alternative to effort notion. In, Dance Technology: Current Applications and Future Trends, Gray JA, ed., Reston, VA:NDA/AAHPERD.

3. Bruderlin A (1992): How to produce movement with a computer. Dance and Technology I: Moving Toward the Future, Proceedings of the First Annual Conference, Smith AW, ed. Columbus, OH: Fullhouse Publishing.

4. Costa M (1991): Technology, artistic production and the "aesthetics of communication." Leonardo 24(2):123-125.

5. Czikszentmihalyi, M (1991): The Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper & Row.

6. Dubois K (1994): Dance and weightlessness: Dancers' training and adaptation problems in microgravity. Leonardo 27(1):57-64.

7. Forest F (1991): Aesthetics and telecommunications systems. Leonardo 24(2):137-138.

8. Gendlin ET (1991): The wider role of bodily sense in thought and language. In, Giving the Body Its Due, Sheets-Johnstone, M, ed. Albany, NY:State University of New York Press.

9. Hanna T (1990/91): Clinical somatic education: A new discipline in the filed of health care. Comatics VIII (1):4-11.

10. Hanna T (1994): Three principles of somatology> Somatics IX(4):4-9.

11. Laurel B (1991): Computers as Theatre. New York:Addison- Wesley Publishing Company.

12. Lovell RE, Mitchell JD: Using human movement to control activities in theatrical environments. Dance and Technology III: Transcending Boundaries, Proceedings of the Third Annual Conference at York University, Smith, AW, ed. Columbus, OH: Fullhouse Publishing.

13. McFee G (1992): Understanding Dance. London: Routledge Press.

14. Pribram, KH (1991): Brain and Perception: Holonomy and Structure in Figural Processing. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers (Especially Chapters 2 and 3).

15. Shearer RR (1992): Chaos theory and fractal geometry: Their potential impact on the future of art. Leonardo 25(2):143-152.

16. Stafford BM (1985): Art, Nature and the Illustrated Travel Account, 1760-1840. Cambridge, MA:MIT Press, pp. 421-422.

17. Von Foerster H (1989): The need of perception for the perception of needs. Leonardo 22(2):223-226.