“Pressure sequence is an exploration of movement, a question of presence, a reconnaissance of body language. Pressure Sequence started out as a question: Dancing is body language at its purest. But can you transform, translate this language? What happens if you strip away the visual layer? What is left, what do we create, what presence remains? Do we create new images? Is it still dance? Do we move along? So I asked three contemporary dancers to dance for me, and I recorded the sounds they made using different microphones. Then I went to the studio and started to create a piece in a quadraphonic format, using these sounds. I wanted to explore the intimacy of the body in movement. The movement of bodies is translated into the movement of air molecules. I’m looking for the resonance of those movements in pressure variations. With this piece, I want to create a presence that is only tangible in sound, one that needs to be completed by the listener, by his or her imagining the new form, feeling the movement. Pressure Sequence is a quadraphonic installation. This video is a registration of a possible setup of the piece and uses a binaural registration of the installation. Dancers for the original sounds were Marisa Cabal Georgia Vardarou, Veli Lehtovaara and Eleanor Campbell. Recordings were made at the STUK arts centre in Louvain, Belgium. The piece was edited at Overtoon / Deepblue, Brussels, Belgium. The video was shot at de Pianofabriek, Brussels, Belgium. I would like to thank Georgia, Marisa, Veli and Eleaonor; Pieter-Paul at STUK and Christoph and Ilse at Overtoon / Deepblue. Karlien and her crew at Pianofabriek. Pierre van Heddegem for shooting and editing the video. I would also like to thank Barbara Riera and Dolores Hulan for dancing for me during the test recordings for the production of Pressure Sequence.” – Stijn Demeulenaere
Pressure Sequence – Dance and Sound – Stijn Demeulenaere
