The Presence Project: Presence workshops

Between January and June 2006 the Centre for Intermedia [link] at Exeter University will host a series of six Performing Presence workshops by leading theatre and performance practitioners. The project will gather video and sound recordings of workshops, sound recordings of interviews with contributing artists, and record round table discussion.

This page provides a starting point for a discussion of how to document these events through the Collaboratory.

Aim:

to construct an evolving document that interrogates concepts or practices of presence in the selection and framing of recorded materials

Materials:

selected downloadable video-clips
video-grab images
video soundtrack
edited audio recordings of interviews and round table discussion
edited or revised interview texts
textual extracts from video and sound recordings
invited responses, the posting of analogous or related recordings, interviews, statement and texts

Emphasis:

the organisation of ‘evidence’
the provocation of responses
connections between ‘unconnected’ practices
documentation as recollection, transformation and reply

Method:

articulating multiple relationships between elements
cross-referencing between media, between image, sound and text
accounting for the materiality of the medium in order to speculate over transformations (what is gained and what is lost)
announcing and tracking the editorial process
stimulus and response - the building a collectively-authored document that reveals its own history and construction

Points of reference:

Michael Shanks, Sicily – 33 Archaeological Moments [link]. In this Site Report, 33 archaeological moments are grouped under four principles. Some moments, however, appear in more than one grouping, alerting the reader to the transformation of the ‘moment’ through its context and/or its resistance to reframing.