ELECTRIC BELLY DANCER

Exploring sacredness in primal womenıs dance and interactive technology.

 

The spiritual realms have always been inextricably bound to artistic image, Icons, symbols, mandalas and physical movement assist the elevation of the soul. These types of visual images are alive with metaphysical meaning. Spiritual dance, image and sound assist the connection to the higher realms of consciousness. Cybodule looks at the interaction between the contemporary and the archaic. We are a collaboration that uses art and movement to represent our spiritual philosophy. This involves acknowledging the body as a vehicle of spiritual expression. It may be my body but I dance. The project represents the yin yang connection, the marriage of science and nature, where one contains an element of the other. Belly dance the poem of creation, the first and most enduring dance form rooted in sacred ritual. The dance is shamanic and celebrates physical and creative fertility. Cybodule aims to realise these features via computer technology. The dance represents the manifestation of the none manifest. The latency of formless chaos and therefore pure creation, has a parallel in digital terms in that the openness of interactive systems is related to the latency of potential within the data base. The structure of the installation represents the eternal inter-relationship between order and anarchy. The combination of primal metaphysics with cyboculture and cyboaesthetics, describes the formation of a future-ancient temple,-where art, worship and altered consciousness are contained within the one experience.

Arabic dance is framed in an installation, whose components include a ten foot interactive projection of various permutations of Ishtar the electric belly dancer, as she dances her way through the 42 video loops .The virtual Ishtar is stimulated to dance by interactive pressure pads. As these projections are being activated by the dancer (or any one wishing to participate in the process ). We are simultaneously exposed to slide images of sacred feminine icons and symbols. These are juxtaposed with presumably mundane, modern ritual and transforming objects, such as seductively shot anthropomorphised depilatory products! Because of the close up framing of slides of the hand made costumes, we are forced to look at their detail, complexity and creativity. Because we are forced to look closely we are reminded of the often unseen women's art, and the fact that Arab womenıs dance is indeed a sacred art form.

To compliment the moves of Ishtar, we have specially composed ambient sounds including Interacted loops of Ishtar singing in Arabic and English. Our initiative realizes the cross over of dance and digital media and its accessibility in the public realm.

We feel the Goddess is alive and is represented in our project. Our work is about joy, beauty and healing as well as a sensory mind altering experience. The total effect is immersive, evocative . The effects are consciousness changing. The venue becomes a temple. The user co-creates her/his virtual reality, dancing her own dance. The audience-performer-worshiper colludes in the experience. The potential is there for a shamanic journey which concludes with the connection to the great female archetype that exists in us all - women, children, men and the transgendered. All it needs is you.

Dance is a metaphor for the universal processes. We are on a journey which we choreograph our selves. Our lives are moulded by technology, this is not unnatural or anti spiritual. We are demonstrating how the spiritual potential of the dance can be illuminated via computer wizardry. Belly dance was originally performed to worship the Goddess. The contemporary perception of the dance has been distorted by patriarchal, monotheistic culture. We use discreet techno to bring belly danceı back to its original pure form of a holistic sacred technology. Because it is viewed larger than life in a sacred context we will hopefully see the image in a sacred way.

Arab dance is the dance of life and death. Armen Ohaninan described it as representing, ıThe joy and suffering with which a new soul is brought into the worldı. The dance is a celebration of the life force, and women's role in the continuation of life. The Myth of the Goddess Ishtar is symbolic of the inner journey and the shamanic transformations that we may aspire to. To find her dead lover, Ishtar journeys deeper and deeper into the seven realms of the underworld paying the gate keepers to access each particular level. She pays with seven jewels (presumably symbolic of the seven chakras) and seven veils (seven identities or Jungian masks). Ishtar guides us through our psychological death-rebirth cycle, and represents the inevitable transmutation of the universe.

The work reminds us that the mind body and soul are one .The personal self is an aspect of the universal self and visa -versa. The piece makes us aware that even though the medium is futuristic, the spiritual power is intact and unchanging.

The project is a response to the artists desire to bring sacredness into public performance spaces ,that will reconnect and heal the Cartesian split of human identity. Likewise our project aspires to empower all types of people to dance their higher selves.