@BUSTLELAMP

LUCID POSSESSION is a live mix cinema performance. Musicians, a video DJ, and stage-controlled robotic screens combine to present a contemporary ghost story – a poetic musing on managing the mass of online information “noise”. Lucid Possession draws the audience into a world  in  which video characters come to life: the wave of a hand moves a video body, and video characters lip synch live to a singer. The players onstage collectively perform the movie, which spills off the dynamic, dimensional screens onto the stage. The result is like a complex three-dimensional, automated video pop-up book, and as characters are brought to life through motion, voice, and robotics, the boundaries of the real and virtual are blurred.

We’re happy to announce some new developments for Lucid Possession! Issue Project Room and Roulette will be co-producing the New York premiere at the new Roulette theater in the spring of 2013. Stay tuned for further news and details. Follow us on Facebook or Twitter for updates and announcements (see bar to the right for follow info).

Bob McGrath of Ridge theater is co-directing with us. We’re thrilled to have his vision enhancing the project. Todd Reynolds, violinist. composer and technologist, will be joining us as musical director and performer. Todd will be composing noise segments for the piece as well as playing violin and some crazy custom interface instruments we are cooking up with Ed Bear, our resident multi-talented engineer and artist. Ed is also building some new robotic screens. Leif Krinkle, artist and robotics engineer – who built the incredible main robotic ghost screen (above) for Lucid – is working with us on multiples and other ingenious hardware designs.

This is the Petbot. A virtual screen-based video robot that lip-synchs live to Toni Dove onstage.

It’s a great team as always, with the brilliant R. Luke DuBois on software design. Incandescent Hai-Ting Chinn, mezzo soprano, sings and has the lead role onscreen, and the glamorous singer/performer Bora Yoon (above) is her onscreen nemesis.

In the sample above from work in progress shows at The Spielart Festival, Munich and at Republique, Copenhagen, we see an opening video clip, then move between stage and screen to meet Bean, our lead character, and get a hint of what she’s dealing with: ghosts from the past, noise in the present. It’s a juggling act and she has some big problems to solve. Some of you may find her problems familiar.

In this clip we meet Bean’s Avatar and hear some backstory. What kind of ghosts are we dealing with? Bean’s Avatar sings “She Won’t Know” from a song cycle composed for Lucid Possession by our long time friend and collaborator Elliott Sharp, composer and multi instrumentalist.

It’s clear there are some blurry boundaries between real and virtual, person and doppleganger. Images seem to inhabit multiple worlds in multiple forms. Is it surprising that Bean is having an identity crisis?

Visit us again for more about Bean and her friends. Contact us for presentation and touring information at td@tonidove.com