Burda Style For people who sew

Description

The Perfect Human performance takes place in public space, using a motion-capture costume and portable radios. The technology worn by the performer plays the role of an interpreter, mapping statements to her bodily expressions. These statements are translated into spoken words, broadcast and played back through surrounding radios.
The performer copies the movements of the person inside the marked space. This allows the audience to explore the system through the mirroring of movement, moreover they have to themselves become involved in order to perform the role of the perfect human.

The performance is inspired by Joergen Leth’s 1967 short film “The Perfect Human” and Lars von Trier’s “The Five Obstructions” (2003). We intend to create a sixth obstruction, by introducing the rule of performance and the rule of non-linear narration.

Material Notes

lots of slightly off-white cotton jersey, some plain cotton for the collar, many spools of white thread and some different colour threads, 1.5 mm thick neoprene, stretch conductive fabric, conductive thread, Velostat, Aleene's stretchy fabric glue, LilyPad Arduino wearable microcontroller, multiplexers, perfboard, XBee, zip, tons of 1cm metal machine poppers, some perforated foam for the sensors under the feet This costume (except for the electronics in the removable collar) is totally washable!

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Credits

The Puppeteer motion-capture costumes are a project by Mika Satomi and Hannah Perner-Wilson.

The Perfect Human is performed by Ivana Kalc.

Thanks to Ingo Randolf, Kunstuniversitaet Linz, Interface Cultures and Ars Electronica Festival 2008