Light Manipulation

Light is an source of energy that we as humans find very useful. Without light, we would not be able to see as light is actually the only thing our eyes can "see". Those tiny holes in our eyes are used to take in light reflected off objects. Colours that we see is the colour of the light reflected from that object.

We are currently exploring light as resource and how we can manipulate it and incorporate it into a dance piece. I am working in a group with two other people and we are creating a study using stillness and light. Only one movement can be seen, ie we are only allowed to move within total darkness.

The easiest source of light we were able to use and manipulate is a normal desk lamp. We also examined the use of sounds that the lamp created when being switched on, bent etc.


As you can see, the desk lamp has quite a wide circuferance of visibility, depending on how far the bulb is from whatever is being lit. We chose to use closeness and focus on points of a body and use the light to investigate the shapes we can make using just one light source and a still person.

A question that Simon asked ~ Do you feel this is a dance piece?
My answer ~ No. I think, knowing that I like those classic, traditional works that this is of course completely different to what we are doing at the moment. I like working with the lights, however, and I feel this is a good stimulus for a dance piece. Doing this task has widened my mind about the uses of light and reminded me to think about all possibilities, not just the obvious ones.