DTS Seminar Series, Semester 2
Mondays at 6:00-7:30pm
Room 226, Building 68 (Performing Arts Complex)
Monash University Clayton Campus
See map at bottom of page
For further information or to offer a paper for future seminars, contact Felix Nobis.
- 21st July
-
Prof Rachel Fensham & Dr Odette Kelada
Dance and Diaspora
Using the idea of the ‘transmigration of soles’, this seminar aims to explore how the experience of diaspora has shaped the artistic careers and creative work of two Malaysian choreographers in Australia. It will look at how traditional performance practices have informed their artistic techniques and cultural strategies as they adapt and translate their dance forms in relation to a new home nation.
This seminar will consist of two papers and a short screening; the first paper presented by Prof. Fensham on ‘Chandrabhanu: the androgynous body as home’, and the second by Dr. Kelada on ‘Tony Yap and the migratory trance body’.
- 4th August
-
Danielle Wilde
Swing that Thing
Danielle Wilde will discuss her current doctoral research into how technology might be paired with the body to poeticise experience (and what this might mean).
Primary aims of this research include understanding how one might incite people to move and extend themselves physically; the value of a direct consideration of the body’s tendencies and affordances when creating interactive body-centric elements and systems; the value of visceral experience and full-body, or ‘beyond limb- and digit-triggered’ interaction; the idiosyncratic nature of relationships to the body and technology; and provoking, inciting or inspiring reflection about these relationships through the creation of wearable works of art, design and performance.
Related projects include highly visible, extended and extending interfaces through to “invisible”, embedded and distributed systems, which allow the wearer to actuate and control changes in sound, colour, light, shape and form. The research builds upon more than ten years of experience pairing interactive technology with the body, with a particular emphasis on performance and performativity. Outcomes include wearable artefacts, performances, performance interventions and the development of interfaces for use by the general public.
Danielle Wilde is an artist and design researcher based in Melbourne, Australia, and a doctoral candidate at Monash University Faculty of Art and Design and the CSIRO Division of Textile and Fibre Technology in Belmont, near Geelong (part of the CSIRO Division of Materials Science and Engineering). Danielle will discuss her doctoral research and will raise the challenges of developing performance with interactive wearable interfaces. Primary aims of Wilde’s doctoral research include understanding how one might incite people to move and extend themselves physically; the value of a direct consideration of the body’s tendencies and affordances when creating interactive body-centric elements and systems; the value of visceral experience and full-body, or ‘beyond limb-and-digit-triggered’ interaction; the idiosyncratic nature of relationships to the body and technology; and provoking, inciting or inspiring reflection about these relationships through the creation of wearable works of art, design and performance. Related projects include highly visible, ex-tended and extending interfaces through to “invisible”, embedded and distributed systems, which al-low the wearer to actuate and control changes in sound, colour, light, shape and form. The research builds upon more than ten years of experience pairing interactive technology with the body, with a particular emphasis on performance and performativity.
Seminar jointly organised with ECPS Communications and Media Studies. View the Communications and Media Studies seminar series program here.
- 18th August
-
Dr Fiona Gregory
An Alternative Ophelia
Embodying Madness on the late-Victorian Stage
In 1897, audiences warmly welcomed Johnston Forbes-Robertson’s new interpretation of Hamlet to the London stage. His sane, intelligent prince was received as a pleasing departure from tradition. Mrs Patrick Campbell’s own experiments with the role of Ophelia in this production were not so welcome. Critics described her playing as “curiously weak” and “unconvincing and unimpressive.” Campbell had rejected the conventional model of the character as emblem of prettiness and pathos and instead offered a vacant, depressive, “beaten” Ophelia. This paper examines the influences behind this choice, including the actress’s own experience of mental illness and the notorious “rest cure” treatment regime. I read the reception of this performance in terms of contemporary attitudes to Ophelia and mental illness as well as responses to Campbell and her celebrity identity. In seeking to re-cast Campbell’s achievements in this role, the paper ultimately calls for a broader perspective in determining the constitutive elements of a performance event, and affirms the importance of careful consideration of the performer’s identity (personal identity, professional identity, celebrity identity) when analyzing the reception of past performances.
- 1st September
-
Monash BPA Graduate Ensemble
A selection of 4 – 5 short papers on a variety of subjects
- 15th September
-
Lisa Petty
Foxtrots and Air Raids: The Role of Dance within World War II
Katerina Kokkinos-Kennedy
The Beast's Banquet: A Theatrical Take on Romance, Vampires, Tom Cruise and Pre-Nuptial Agreements
- 6th October
-
Michael Coe
A Mad Scenography!
- 27 October
-
Group Activity
End of semester discussion/meeting/drinks
Map to Venue
The venue is room 226, on the second floor of Building 68 on the Clayton Campus. Navigate using the interactive Google map, or download the Clayton campus map in PDF format.