Son(net) Subterfuge

Son(net) Subterfuge was a collaborative project among artists in Amsterdam, New York, and Helsinki. It was a live performance that happened simultaneously, and differently, in each location, coordinated at a central hub in Amsterdam. It was organized by Josephine Dorado at the Waag Society.

At the basis of the project was an invitation to interpret or subvert Shakespeare sonnets as a sound or video piece, and stream it to the Waag Society, where it was incorporated into a dance performance.

I organized a team of artists from the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University. We used analog and digital signal processing techniques to create audio and digital video. We streamed this to Amsterdam, where it was mixed with a source from Helsinki and prerecorded audio to create the score for the dance performance.

Meanwhile, the Waag Society streamed video of their performance to us and Helsinki. We projected this onto a wall in our own space. Thus they danced to our music; we interpreted their dance as our music....

With a minute or more lag between transmission and reception points, we operated in a feedback loop with a built in delay, and simultaneously fulfilled a feedback cycle of interpretive give and take.

Son(net) Subterfuge was a real-time interactive multimedia trans-cultural interpretation of Shakespeare.

We were invited to interpret or subvert sonnets numbered 19, 30, 56, and/or 124. Each dealt thematically with difficulties of separation.