L&D

An exploration of what it is that makes 'you'?

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Introduction:

‘L&D’ began as an exploration of the liveness debate and how one might deceive an audience into a portrayal of live movement both physically and digitally. It shows how movement and speech can be perceived to be live to an audience but on the contrary in reality it has been pre-recorded. Subsequently, whilst liveness and deception were the fundamental basis of the piece, it was the introduction of the theoretical paradox’s of ‘The Ship of Theseus’ and the ‘Teletransportation Paradox’ that informed the conceptual nature of the choreography; the driving force behind choreographic decisions. Throughout this blog I will explain both paradoxes in detail and elaborate on their importance to the process culminating in the final product whilst also exploring their unlikely relation to the liveness debate; particularly between the Teletransportation Paradox and the liveness debate.

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The Ship of Theseus:

The Ship of Theseus paradox developed from the ancient tale of a king named Theseus, who allegedly founded the city of Athens. It was because of Theseus’ many naval battles that the people of Athens dedicated a memorial to him, by preserving his ship in the port.  It is from here in which the Paradox begins to develop; as in order to preserve Theseus’ ship, parts of the ship would have to be replaced. As the wood would begin to rot over time, eventually after many years had passed the ship would be completely renewed.  The question that this now created and where the paradox begins is when the following debate develops ‘is that still ‘The Ship of Theseus?’ This tall tale has been debated and used for years in philosophical discussions of the problems of identity (Yanofsky, 2013:1).  

‘The Ship where in Theseus and the youth of Athens returned had thirty oars, and was preserved by the Athenians down even to the time of Demetrius Phalereus, for they took away the old planks as they decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their place, insomuch that this ship became a standing example among the philosophers, for the logical question of things that grow; one side holding that the ship remained the same, and the other contending that it was not the same.’ (Dryden, n.d.)

Within ‘The Ship of Theseus’ paradox there are many hypothetical situations that arise when debating the identity of The Ship of Theseus I am going to discuss two situations that are commonly debated and relate them to the process of my work.  Firstly, Situation 1 being ‘The Ship of Theseus’ gradually being replaced (ship A), and secondly, situation 2 is following the same path as situation 1 except a third ship is created from the ‘original’ planks of ‘The Ship of Theseus’ (Ship B). It was situation 2 which sparked my interest into which ship holds more weight to the identity of The original Ship of Theseus. As Garrett states in his article ‘Noonan, ‘Best Candidate’ theories and ‘The Ship of Theseus’ ‘the continuously repaired ship and the plank-hoarder's ship are both candidates for identity with The Ship of Theseus, though the former ship has the stronger claim.’ (Garret, 1985: 213) Thus suggesting that the continuously repaired ship has the strongest claim to the identity of ‘The Ship of Theseus’. I wanted to explore this within my performance and how you could take ‘The Ship of Theseus’ theories into the dance space, this was found when returning to the liveness debate: A topic discussed earlier on during my studies that had previously captured my attention and coincidentally held similarities with ‘The  Ship of Theseus’s’ complications.  

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‘Liveness’ and The Ship of Theseus:

The liveness debate has been deliberated for a long time within the dance space since the term live was coined. The debate being on various points of live/mediatised dance space, but largely on the notion that dance is ephemeral, it is experienced in the moment and any attempt to recreate that does not hold as much value. As Peggy Phelan states in ‘The Ontology of Performance: Representation Without Reproduction’ ‘Performance’s only life is in the presence. Performance cannot be saved, recorded, documented, or otherwise participate in the circulation of representations of representations.’ (Phelan, 1993:146) The idea that performance is fleeting and that any representation or reproduction in a mediatised form is no longer characteristic of the performance, follows the same principles of the ‘best candidate’ theory of ‘The Ship of Theseus’ paradox. As I wanted to explore the fleeting nature of dance in the live space I decided on performing a repetative movement sequence, recorded and then projected onto a screen and then re-recorded, to then again be projected during the final performance, with the camera still left in the space.

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How I applied the Liveness debate through the technology:

The resoning behind having the camera set up in the space was to give the illusion that the feed was live, addressing that with new advancements in technology, including the introduction of live feed that it has been incorporated into modern life culture. ‘Live performance now often incorporates mediatisation to the degree that the live event itself is a product of media technologies… In the theatre, as at the stadium you are often watching television even when attending the live event, and audiences now expect live performances to resemble mediatized ones.’  (Auslander, 2008:25&26) Upon reflection the set up of the performance resembled that of a miniature concert, with the projector and two smaller screens, not too dissimilar to the popular set up used at music and comedy festivals.

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How I applied the Liveness debate through the technology part 2:

But as the sequence was repeated. The reasoning for repetition is explained further in blog post ‘Choreographic decisions for projection’) the intention was for the audience to notice the other elements of the performance, that in order for the projection to be live the presentations on the projection would reflect upon itself and go on endlessly, much like when you face two mirrors towards each other creating an infinite reflection. The difference being that the recordings is not a reflection of one another but a reproduction. Hence, if you were to apply situation 2 of ‘The Ship of Theseus’ to the individual recordings and the live moment; meaning the original recording, the recording with the original and the live performance individual Identify with the original ‘Ship of Theseus’ and ship A and B respectively.

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Problems between Projection and The Ship of Theseus:

Although I followed a similar pathway to ‘The Ship of Theseus paradox’, upon reflection I realised a problem had occurred. Looking back at situation 2 of said paradox ‘Ship A’, was a gradual replacement of the ‘ship of Theseus’ and ‘Ship B’, being a collection of the former planks.  The problem occurs when matching  the individual ship to one of the three performances, the recordings or the live section. Looking at Garret’s article ‘Noonan, ‘Best Candidate’ theories and The Ship of Theseus’ article again he states ‘we can truly say that, but for the existence of [A] in situation 2, [B] would not have existed at all.’ (Garrett, 1985:214) meaning that if ‘ship A’ was not created from the gradual replacement of The Ship of Theseus, then ‘ship B’ would cease to exist, due to the fact the collection of planks could not happen if they were not being replaced. This is where the projection comes to a similar problem, as without the original recording when the movement was first documented, the following recording would not be possible. Therefore the live performance of said work could still be possible but the artistic intention would also cease to exist.  Assessing both situations then ‘The Ship of Theseus’ must identify with the live performance of the movement, because without the gradual replacement of the ship’s planks ‘The Ship of Theseus’ would cease to exist due to rotting over time, parallel to which without the projections so would the artistic intention of the live performance.

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Problems between Projection and The Ship of Theseus Part 2:

In order for the live performance to identify with ‘The Ship of Theseus’ it would have to be considered the original - surely? Peggy Phelan States in ‘Unmarked the politics of performance’

‘Performances only life is in the present. Performance cannot be saved, recorded, documented, or otherwise participate in the circulation of representations of representations: once it does so, it becomes something other than performance.’ (Phelan, 1993: 146) So following Phelan’s opinion I would reiterate that the live performance is the original, but in order for the live performance to commence in the format I set it, it must become a ‘representation of a representation, of a representation’ contrasting with Phelan’s claim. ‘Performance occurs over a time which will not be repeated. It can be performed again, but this repetition marks it as “different”. The document of a performance then only a spur to memory’ (Phelan, 1993: 146) But as previously mentioned ‘this repetition marks it as different’ was a recognition that I wanted the audience to see, which in turn would mean Phelan would suggest the pre-recorded movement was “different” to the live movement rather than vice versa. Instead I think the term ‘electronic ontology’ fits better to this situation, in which the TV or a projection is in a constant state of fluidity due to the interlacing of images to create movement. This  term allows the projection to be conscious in the live space, leaving the question of originality to the audiences’ perception. ‘The televisual image’s existence only in the present also obviates the notion that television (and video) is a form of reproduction.’ (Auslander, 2008:48)

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Choreographic decisions for projection:

When it came to creating the movement for the projection section which the deception of live feed was to commence, I chose to follow a simplistic and repetitive approach. This decision was made both from a minimalist perspective and a liveness perspective. From a minimalist perspective it wasn’t for the audience to take interpretation from the movement ‘one movement can give a whole ‘paragraph’ of content’ (Smith-Autard, 2010:23) but instead to notice what would otherwise go unseen, similar to what is mentioned in ‘How I applied the Liveness debate through the technology part 2’, about recognising the lack of infinite screens on the projection. I made the decision to keep the movement simple to notice the irregularities between each repeated sequence from all three performances. This coincided with my decision to insert a section of silence in order for there to be no distractions and allow the audience to focus purely on the movement on the projection and how it echoed through to the live reiteration of the movement. So whilst Jennifer Roche states in ‘multiplicity, embodiment and the contemporary dancer, moving identities’:

‘They are no longer called upon to represent the dance piece once it enters the archive, rendering their material presence insignificant in comparison to the more important artistic or political statements proposed by the choreographer through the choreography.’ (Roche, 2015:3)

I argue the opposite as in order for the artistic statement and the questioning of liveness to continue both the ‘archived’ and the live material would have to be performed simultaneously. If not, the artistic impetuous would be rendered useless. What didn’t coincide with the artistic impetuous and ultimately didn’t fit with the rest of the piece was the following solo from Emma to music, due to the inclusion of music and more intricate movement being introduced the section became less about noticing the small idiosyncrasies that the former duet showed, removing the ability to question the ‘live’ aspect of the movement. Although the questioning of presence being relevant to the projection section, the speech section would be of required presence in order for  the live space to create the impact needed. In defining ‘liveness’, ‘Auslander places emphasis upon the relationship between spectator and performer, rather than on whether the performer is live or recorded, human or digital.’ (Popat, 2011:140)

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Importance of speech Section:

The speech section was the first moment in which I gave the audience verbal substance into what I was exploring as an artist, with both the title and my programme notes being deliberately vague, as I didn’t want the audience to have a preconceivedidea. I originally pondered on not having any programme notes but eventually settled on the question of ‘what is it that makes you?’ Therefore allowing the audience to develop answers to this question rather than ponder on what ‘L&D’ meant.

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Content of Speech section:

The content of the speech section was a combination of both ‘The Ship of Theseus’ and the ‘Teletransportation Paradox’. Recognising early on that ‘The Ship of Theseus’ only worked within an objectivity sense of the body, it would fall apart subjectively as a boat cannot think for itself. This is where I turned to the ‘Teletransportation Paradox’ allowing the process of thought to be introduced within the sense of identity. ‘I think, therefore I am’ (Descartes, 1637) Throughout the performance I invited the audience to think about the piece, provoking them to think and rethink about everything that came previous to  this section meant, but it wasn’t until this section that I actually addressed both the notion of thought and the gradual change of ‘human beings’.

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