Date of Award

2017

Document Type

Honors Thesis (Open Access)

Department

Colby College. Theater and Dance Dept.

Advisor(s)

Annie Kloppenberg

Second Advisor

Jim Scott

Abstract

This paper argues that dance devising shares a value system with that of the digital age, justifying the use of a virtual choreographic site to facilitate geographically distributed collaborations. The presence of technology in our social lives, working environments, and creative practices is steadily increasing. Before we passively let technology digitize and make virtual the choreographic process, or before we expedite this seemingly inevitable trajectory, we need to know what the consequences and opportunities might be. Through use of a controlled empirical investigation, this study analyzed the process experience, composition, and post-performance audience response between in-person and remote choreographic collaborations. While the data ultimately presented several implications of choreographing remotely, a digitally-mediated process required the dancers and choreographers to deeply question their dance-making and performance assumptions, a fundamental value of devising practices. As a pedagogical tool, supplementary rehearsal component, or method of facilitating geographically distributed collaborations, digitally-mediated dance devising has a promising future.

Keywords

non-telematic performance, post-modern, long-distance, statistics, survey, ATLAS.ti

Multimedia URL

Included in

Dance Commons

Share

COinS