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*Special website http://holistic-strata.ycam.jp/

YCAM performing arts original production 2010 unveiled!
The criticality of perception highlighted in a spectacle of light, sound, and the human body


Hiroaki Umeda, a choreographer who has been attracting attention in Japan and abroad with his "visual performances" blending imagery, sound and dance, presents his brand new dance piece at the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]. Holistic Strata is a YCAM original production developed with the Center's expert staff during the artist's stay in Yamaguchi, with the aim to break new ground in the filed of body expression integrating media technology.
Based on his own set designs mixing imagery and sound, Hiroaki Umeda equivalently combines in his pieces elements of light, sound, and the human body. For his audiences, these performances are opportunities to experience their own bodies' primary reactions triggered by intensely stimulating light and sound. Visitors to the performance at YCAM are likely to witness another leap forward by the choreographer who has been harnessing information technology to conquer the world with nothing but his body and a computer. Look forward to a novel type of performance that will rock your body senses and challenge your perception.

Hiroaki Umeda takes charge not only of the parts of choreography and dance, but designs also the optical and acoustic aspects of his stage productions. Interested in the effects of visual impact on the audience, he creates stimulating settings of intense lights and colors, which he synchronizes with his own improvised dance to great acclaim especially in Europe and the USA. Most recently he was awarded an Honorary Mention for Adapting for Distortion at the Ars Electronica media art festival (digital music & sound art category), and enjoys a growing international reputation in various fields beyond the boundaries of dance.


"Adapting for Distortion" (2008)　photo: Alex


Holistic Strata:
Layers of light, sound, and the human body

Spatial exercise by physical data - Engulfing the audience with sharp imagination
In addition to the characteristic elements of light and sound in his previous works, Hiroaki Umeda's new piece Holistic Strata introduces a new system built around a key component of "physical data" generated by the dancer's body and its movements. During his two-month residency at YCAM, Umeda's creative work with an eye to touring the result on a global scale was based on the development of technologies and plans according to the piece's concept, assisted by the YCAM InterLab team of media art specialists.
A further leap forward from Umeda's tried and tested concept of treating light, sound and the human body as equivalent means of expression on stage, Holistic Strata revolves around the body as a complex cluster of information that configures actual spaces. The conversion into data for manipulating light and sound of dancer Umeda's body data (movements of muscles and locomotion coordinates) with the help of sensing technology results in the creation of a scenery that integrates dance, sound, and intensely blinking light. It will be challenging to see how the data of the body, broken up into the same information units (bit) as light and sound, will be represented in the viewer's perception when Umeda implants his improvised dance in the surrounding space, or lets it arise right in front of the audience. Based on this system of freely generated imagination, Holistic Strata proposes "dance" as a spatial expression, while highlighting the criticality of our perception.

Talk event * Talk events after each performance
* Admission only with performance ticket
Talk events with Hiroaki Umeda will take place after each performance. On February 19 (Sat), Umeda will discuss the main appeal of Holistic Strata, while the event on the following day will include a presentation introducing the technology used in the piece.
* Japanese only


"Haptic" (2008)　photo: Bertrand Baudry


"while going to a condition" (2002) photo: Shin Yamagata



Organized by: Yamaguchi City Foundation for Cultural Promotion
In association with: Yamaguchi City, Yamaguchi City Board of Education
Grants from: Japan Foundation for Regional Art-Activities (JAFRA),
THE SEASON FOUNDATION, EU-Japan Fest Japan Committee
Equipment cooperation: Color Kinetics Japan Incorporated
Supported by the Agency for Cultural Affairs Government of Japan in the fiscal 2010
Co-developed with: YCAM InterLab
Produced by: Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media [YCAM]