Behind the scenes of Last Dance: The Wave Epoch
Visual artist Haroon Mirza is one of four people behind Last Dance: The Wave Epoch, a unique collaboration for Brighton Festival (24 May) between fellow artist Jack Jelfs, grime DJ and producer Elijah and musician GAIKA that imagines what life will be like in 2000 years’ time.
Devised and created at the world’s largest scientific experiment — the Large Hadron Collider at CERN — the immersive-club experience imagines a scenario where the collider has been rediscovered by a future civilization and turned into a ceremonial site, similar to Stonehenge.
The event is part of Lighthouse’s Last Dance programme, headed up by Elijah as Associate Artistic Director, which looks at the changing nature of club culture.
Lighthouse caught up with Haroon to find out more.
What will people who come to The Wave Epoch be experiencing?
The event will be a staged performance, something in between a gig and a screening.
What are the main themes of The Wave Epoch?
Club culture; future archaeology; belief systems; social rituals.
How has it been created?
The Wave Epoch is the result of an ongoing conversation originated amidst Elijah, GAIKA, Jack Jelfs and I — Jack and I were invited to be the artists in residency at CERN in Geneva, where we started talking about this idea of future archaeology. We found it had a nice parallel in Elijah’s interest in the evolution of club culture.
What material was gathered and created at CERN for The Wave Epoch?
Salvaged electronics and video footage. The footage consists of interviews with physicists, led by Jack and I, and the outcome of a video shoot which happened in February at various locations inside CERN, for which we invited GAIKA and Elijah.
How was your experience of working with Elijah and GAIKA? What did the act of this collaboration bring to the artistic process?
So, Elijah introduced us to GAIKA and this was a bit of a key thing, as it allowed the possibility for different aspects and practices to interact together.
The Last Dance programme as a whole is about the changing face of club culture. How much has this played a part in the creation of The Wave Epoch?
It’s really about projections into the future of what might happen to club culture, I think it’s a human need to gather and engage in ritualistic practices, such as communal dance, so it feels urgent to investigate this as well.
During Brighton Festival, Last Dance: Re-Imagined Futures (8–26 May) at Lighthouse will celebrate and showcase the artistic talent involved in Last Dance, through a series of free talks, workshops and live sessions. Events confirmed so far include those by Platform B, Audio Active, QM Records, Typical Girls and Normal Not Novelty/Red Bull. It will also present an opportunity to see behind-the-scenes footage of The Wave Epoch in the making.
Last Dance: The Wave Epoch takes place on Thursday, 24 May at the Brighthelm Community Centre in Brighton (2pm & 7pm). Tickets cost £10.
To book visit brightonfestival.org or call 01273 709709
