Luminous Pariah performing at SEAF2015
For all you wonderful performers out there who are trying to wrap your brains around what we mean we when say, “interactive performance (formerly ambient performance)”, well hold on to your caps because this is the post for you.
Coming Off The Stage
If you’re sitting at home wondering what rules we have for interactive performance, listen to this story from a couple of years ago first. A volunteer began pushing around a shopping cart that couples were climbing into so they could make out, on parade, around our festival. This was neither a scheduled nor sanctioned performance but our director told our security team to allow it. They weren’t breaking any rules and it’s was a bit of spontaneous genius.
OK, you’re thinking, you still haven’t told me what the rules are for interactive performance. Good catch. So the rules of our festival are fairly straight-forward, no outside alcohol, no touching genitals, and no touching the art. (Clearly there are a couple more but these are the big three). These rules are in place to protect our artists’ work and our liquor license. Because with out the art and the patrons, we wouldn’t have a festival to fill with people to enjoy your performances.
Breaking the 4th Wall
This is where you come in, your performance piece should be enticing and engaging for our patrons so that they can keep claiming our show is one of a kind. Roam around the floor and get people to help you move your performance forward. Stand in one spot, strip naked, and let people write on your body like your skin’s a giant cast. Throw on a mask and hog-tie your partner then drag them off the show floor. Ok, maybe don’t do that last one, people might become concerned.
Interaction with our patrons can mean very different things. You could share space next to them; ask them to hold your props until you need them; invite them to join in your performance (using informed consent practices, of course); or just holding eye contact.
Whatever you do make it fun, make it exciting, make it memorable, make it with dance, movement, improv, spoken word art, acoustic music, singing, pure silence, visual art, clever props, technology, costuming, body art, drawing, and any other form of expression you can think of. You set our show apart from all other erotic shows in Seattle in a special way, so get creative and have fun.
You have until the 31st of January to submit your proposal to our Interactive Performance Curator.
Read more about Interactive Performance proposals here.