"Dances of the Sacred & Profane"(2014) done by Camille Utterback is an hour-long collaborative dance work. It has a motion capture projection which utilizes a real-time particle physics system. The dancers' movements will be captured by the cameras and then projected to panel screens at the background. However, the relationship is not linear in which the pattern projected on the screen does not only depict dancers' movements but also other components such as moving particles interacting with each other. The whole aesthetics here is inspired by the music and art of the Impressionist period. The artist is interested in observing and understanding how images offer a visceral connection between the real and the virtual.
For me, what attracts me the most about this piece is its novel way of interacting with dancers' bodies with technology. Interactions with dancers are familiar and we have seen many performances before, for example, seeing dancers interacting with the music or seeing them having charcoal on them and dance to draw patterns. However, this project took the approach that elevates these interactions into a new place with the invitation of technology. The dances combined the uncertainty of human actions with the imagination of art. It enhanced this concept of using our body to draw. It also visualizes the human interactions in various ways.