Performing Arts in the Digital Age: Interactions and New Directions
Performing Arts in the Digital Age: Interactions and New Directions
Under the auspices of the University of Maryland's Arts for All campus wide initiative, the School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies is undertaking a three-day inaugural exploration of performing arts in the 21st century. The symposium includes three days of workshops, lectures, discussions and performances.
Artists in the performing arts have long been innovative users of digital technology, pushing the limits of what is possible in both live and mediated performance. The current pandemic has taken these innovations in new and exciting directions. Digital technologists have often turned to artists/scholars in the performing arts for everything from storytelling strategies to speech and movement integrations in robotics and animations, to interface design and more. Scholars of the performing arts regularly seek technological solutions to the challenges of researching a subject that is by its nature ephemeral.
Our guest presenters include:
- Miguel Escobar Varela, National University of Singapore and co-chair for Digital Humanities for the International Federation for Theatre Research (IFTR)
- Michael Mark Chemers, University of California Santa Cruz, Department of Performance
- Jyana Browne, University of Maryland, College Park, School of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures and affiliate faculty with the School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies
- I Nyoman Sedana, Indonesian Institute of the Arts in Denpasar, Bali
- Marjan Moosavi, Roshan Institute for Persian Studies at the University of Maryland
- Debra Caplan, Baruch College, City University of New York
- Joshua William Gelb and Katie Rose McLaughlin of Theatre in Quarantine, in residency at TDPS’ Maya Brin Institute for New Performance
Schedule (subject to change):
Thursday, March 10 - International Program for Creative Collaboration and Research
- 9-10:30 a.m. - “International Collaboration in the Age of COVID 19: New Directions for the IPCCR” with presenters I Nyoman Sedana (Indonesian Institute of the Arts), Miguel Escobar Varela (National University of Singapore), Tara Demmy, Kioumars Haeri and Kelley Holley
Friday, March 11
- 9-10:30 a.m. - “The Computational Turn in Theatre Research” by Miguel Escobar Varela (National University of Singapore) and “Digital Guide to Theater of the Middle East: Why Not, Now What?” by Marjan Moosavi (Roshan Institute for Persian Studies at the University of Maryland) and “The Digital Yiddish Theatre Project and the Future of Collaborative Theatre Research” by Debra Caplan (Baruch College, City University of New York)
- 1:15-2:45 p.m. - “Systemic Dramaturgy: A Handbook for the Digital Age” by Michael Mark Chemers (University of California Santa Cruz), “The Integration of Hologram and Vocaloid Performance with Traditional Japanese Bunraku and Kabuki” by Jyana S. Browne (University of Maryland, College Park) and “The Performance of Remastery in Theatre and Media” by Alexander W. Miller
- 3-3:45 p.m. - Performance by Theatre in Quarantine (TiQ) (Joshua William Gelb and Katie Rose McLaughlin)
- 7:30-9:30 p.m. - Livestream of Spring M.F.A. Dance Thesis Concert with work by Rebecca Hill and Tristan Koepke (reserve tickets here)
Saturday, March 12 - The International Federation for Theatre Research: Digital Humanities Working Group - DHWG
- 9-10:30 a.m. - “Virtual Theatre History: Exploring and Displaying Data and Design” by Julie Holledge (Flinders University) and Joanne Tompkins (University of Queensland), “FAIR Theatre Research” by Florian Siemund (Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz) and “Marash” by Rafaella Gasparian and Gustavo Sol (Centro Universitário Belas Artes, São Paulo)
- 10:45 a.m. -12:15 p.m. - “Mapping British Theatre Criticism Thanks to Numbers” by Mylène Maignant (Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris), “Theater Texts as Sources for Historical Performances – a Corpus-Based Digital Approach” by Gabriel Viehhauser and Kirsten Dickhaut (University of Stuttgart) and “Iranian Drama by Numbers: A Computational Analysis of Iranian Plays” by Marjan Moosavi, Mehdy Sedaghat Payam and Baharak Sahami (University of Maryland and Islamic Azad University - Parand Branch)
- 1:15-2:45 p.m. - Workshop by Theatre in Quarantine (TiQ) (Joshua William Gelb and Katie Rose McLaughlin)
The symposium is co-sponsored by:
- The Maya Brin Institute for New Performance
- The International Program for Creative Collaboration and Research (IPCCR)
- The Ph.D. program in Theatre and Performance Studies
- The International Federation for Theatre Research's Digital Humanities Working Group (IFTR-DHWG)
- Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library
About the Maya Brin Experimental Performance Residency (MBEPR)
In collaboration with the "Performing Arts in the Digital Age: Interactions and New Directions” symposium, the Maya Brin Institute for New Performance announces the launch of the launch of the Maya Brin Experimental Performance Residency (MBEPR) at the School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies at the University of Maryland. The Maya Brin Experimental Performance Residency is an incubator for contemporary artists working broadly at the intersections of electronic and digital performing arts. To inaugurate the residency, MBEPR will host Theater in Quarantine (TiQ), a cutting edge company that integrates creative technology with the body in motion to find tactility and dynamic physicality even in remote performance.
TiQ will be in residency from Monday, March 7 to Saturday, March 12. Their work will involve studio visits with UMD students, a public presentation and work retrospective, a showcase of works in progress and a technical masterclass. They are also developing an “impossible project,” featuring live synchronous video and audio feeds from across all seven continents. The project is a hybrid in-person and livestreamed work that addresses the climate crisis, and they will draw on the technical expertise of TDPS faculty, students and staff to develop the work.
About Theatre in Quarantine (TiQ)
Theater in Quarantine is a Drama League Award-winning performance laboratory dedicated to the exploration of the live theatrical experience in the digital space. Established in response to the pandemic by founder/co-creative director Joshua William Gelb and co-creative director Katie Rose McLaughlin, TiQ has live-streamed dozens of visually distinctive, original works to its YouTube channel, working out of a closet in the East Village that is only eight square feet. Their digital and hybrid programming spans genres and styles, with world premieres of new plays, new musicals, adaptations of classic texts, dance and site-specific art installations. The work has been called "virtuosic" by Jesse Green in the New York Times while Helen Shaw in Vulture wrote that the closet “makes confinement a virtue, a prompt to imagination.”
TiQ says, "As the industry resumes in-person performances, we are at an auspicious and challenging moment for our company, whose identity has been thus far wholly digital. We are excited to use opportunities like the Maya Brin Experimental Performance Residency to cement ourselves in a hybrid performance model, maintaining our digital presence while constructing a new in-person style that allows a physical audience to get a behind the scenes view of how we use video processing to create the signature Theater in Quarantine illusions.”