WHAT IS LIVE CINEMA?

“Live Cinema!” expresses the world that exists on the left, right, and center-screen of our minds. Our attention is always split, particularly as we navigate a multitude of screens between phones, computers, TVs.  The effort to make sense of these screens creates a narrative as we jump from source to source, connecting, like a motherboard between systems, selecting and de-selecting where to look.  We operate on several planes at once, and from this we weave an existence which ultimately knits together a cohesive whole.  It is this product which fascinates me, making sense of disparate parts, as is demanded when attending a three-ring circus.

As a filmmaker, professor, and mother, I juggle my dissimilar roles and find meaning.With “Live Cinema!” I generate and perform in expanded media installations.  

“Live Cinema!” is to be shouted out like the call of the circus barker at a three-ring circus.  It has three parts: The Cowgirl, The Sleepwalker, and The Motherboard—with three distinct female characters and their roles to explore.   I use this format as a matrix to create work that incorporates physical theater, layering it with digital media, creating visual textures with projection and performance.

Using my training in Butoh and physical theater, I define each identity with a movement idea: a sleepwalker, balletic with her arms out front; a cowgirl with her pistols handy and her stride strong; a motherboard, mechanical, her limbs moving in isolation. Shot and shown in triptych, the work evolves out of a provocation of character.

My work as a filmmaker keenly focuses on challenges that face the female gender.  In  my Live Cinema! series, I explore women in real and imaginary worlds. Events unfold as characters journey through landscapes and towns, the female figure always alone.

I have built two hybrid-media art pieces which play my work on multiple channels.