At a time when dance inhabits museums and galleries more than ever, the world premiere of “No Body” will occupy the entire building of Sadler’s Wells Theatre with fragments which a performance typically entails - lighting, sound, and projection - but spread across spaces beyond the proscenium, and excluding the physical presence of dancers.Guiding audiences through a multi-sensory installation experience, choreographed by leading lighting designers, composers, choreographers, animators, and film-makers, “No Body” promises to turn the building inside-out, by taking visitors into hidden spaces an audience otherwise never get to see: backstage passages, wardrobe rooms, sound boxes and underground pits, as well as the lighting workshop and control room.Commissioned by Sadler’s Wells Artistic Director, Alistair Spalding, “No Body” brings several artists together to envision how they perceive Sadler’s Wells Theatre without the presence of dancers. Lighting designer and Sadler’s Wells Associate Artist Michael Hulls, who investigated the interaction between dance and light for over twenty years with choreographer and Sadler’s Wells Associate Artist Russell Maliphant, creates “LightSpace” on the main stage. The first immersive experience for the audience is an environment where they are bathed in light and sound, with specially commissioned music by Andy Cowton and Muku, alongside video projection by Jan Urbanowski.Lighting designer and installation artist, Lucy Carter, in collaboration with composer Jules Maxwell, creates a durational kinetic environment called “Hidden” that the audience walks through: “A triptych that explores the backstage life of Sadler’s Wells, in a theatricalized manner, using light to emote and to provoke sensation in the audience,” Carter explains. “Those two disciplines - lighting and choreography - brought me to where I am now, because what I do with light is choreograph it - I create structure and themes, and ideas within the lighting design just like I would a piece of choreography.”Looking at the history of Sadler’s Wells, musician, producer, composer, and Sadler’s Wells Associate Artist Nitin Sawhney conducted extraordinary research in order to explore the sense of presence through “the ghosts of past and even current artists, who all leave an indelible mark upon the building.” His work, “Indelible,” is using binaural headphones to transmit aural history mixed with new composition, along with projections by his long-time collaborator, Yeast Culture’s Nick Hillel, and featuring a number of dancers who re-enact dance sequences of past performances.One recalls the Groupe de Recherche d’Art Visuel (comprising of artists such as Julio Le park, Vera Molnar, and François Morellet, who passed away last week) in the 1960s, which used to organize the so-called “Labyrinth” - a forerunner to interactive art, inviting the public into an immersive opto-kinetic experience.From post-modern dancers, who moved away from the proscenium into public space, to the more radical non-dance movement, the removal of dancers from a dance context event here recalls David Hinton’s found footage video collage, “Birds” (2000), which he submitted to a dance film festival despite an absence of dancers replaced by a cast of birds. Hinton collaborated with choreographer Siobhan Davies twice thus far, and their latest joint project, the film installation “The Running Tongue,” will see its UK premiere at “No Body” inside of a dance studio. Russell Maliphant’s triptych installation “Erebus,” created in collaboration with film directors Warren Du Preeze and Nick Thorton Jones, will be projected at the Lilian Baylis Studio.Blouin Artinfo met some of the featured artists to get a sneak preview.“No Body” runs at Sadler’s Wells from June 7 – June 12, 2016.Tues - Fri at 6.30pm, 7.30pm and 8.30pm; Sat - Sun at 10.30am, 11.30am, 12.30pm, 1.30pm, 5.30pm, 6.30pm, 7.30pm and 8.30pm
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