Dance performance and virtual reality: an investigation of current practice and a suggested tool for analysis

ABSTRACT

The relationship between performance and Virtual Reality (VR) technologies has been ongoing since the initial development of VR in the 1980s. Much has been written about the flurry of experimentation in VR and performance during the 1990s, but not much has been written about more recent work. This article is a contextualisation of recent dance practice made for/in VR and a discussion of any characteristics of that work. For the purpose of this article, my definition of VR includes both 360 film experienced through a VR headset as well as computer-generated virtual environments, also experienced through a VR headset. This article will forefront practice and, drawing on relevant theories and frameworks, discuss the relationship between performance and virtual reality, followed by a discussion of each of the six key works, all of which premiered in 2016–2017. The article goes on to outline the characteristics of this work including types of creative content and the role of the audience and will provide a tool for analysing and understanding VR dance performance work as well as reflecting the importance of interdisciplinary creative teams and collaborative partnerships.

KEYWORDS:

• Dance
• virtual reality
• performance
• emerging technologies
• collaboration
• interdisciplinarity

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributor

Sophy Smith is Professor of Creative Technologies Practice and Director of the Institute of Creative Technologies, part of the Leicester Media School at DeMontfort University. Her research, much of which is practice-based, focuses on the impact of emerging digital technologies on contemporary performance practice. Sophy is co-Director of DAPPer (Digital Arts Performance Practice – emerging research), a space where people working in all areas of digital performance can come together – practitioners, technologists, academics, organisations and all those in-between – to capture, share, discuss, experiment and develop work and ideas relating to digital art and performance. Digital art performance practices are emerging as a response to a fast-moving technological landscape and as artists adapt to these new paradigms it is clear that digital practices are having a profound effect on the ways in which we make and understand our work. It is our contention that whilst many individuals work within their own specialist area or sector, innovation occurs when we have the opportunity to collaborate and cooperate with others. DAPPER aims to provide a space to focus on and interrogate the range of inter/transdisciplinary approaches specifically from the perspective of artistic process and practice.