Shanghai Theatre Academy Workshop, October 2014
On 30–31 October 2014 Scott deLahunta and Florian Jenett, Co-Directors of Motion Bank, conducted an annotation workshop at the Shanghai Theatre Academy. The following is the report on this project.
Building on two previous dance digitisation projects of the choreographer William Forsythe[1], Motion Bank completed its first research phase early 2014 with a diverse range of contemporary European and American choreographers including Deborah Hay, Jonathan Burrows & Matteo Fargion, Bebe Miller and Thomas Hauert.[2]
While this required Motion Bank to develop specific approaches corresponding to each of these individual artists, the project also created basic methods and systems that can be applied to any kind of dance or movement-based performing art. It was on this basis that Prof. Dr. Hans-Georg Knopp for the Shanghai Theatre Academy (STA) approached us in September 2013, with the proposal of applying these methods to Xiqu or Classical Chinese Opera, specifically to conduct an analysis of the movements of Xiqu taking into account the individual styles of the Masters.
Motion Bank research embraced computer-based technologies, but a key methodological development can be found in the form of an evolving understanding of the potential uses of annotation in dance, specifically how annotation can enhance the study and understanding of time based events. This understanding takes into account such components as time, sequence, marking, materials and publishing. Equally important is the preparation for annotation, which involves observing performance material (live or pre-recorded) and interviewing the artists to determine the appropriate categories, names and descriptions for key movement principles or events (e.g. use of the breath, eye movements, using the costume, etc.) to be annotated and commented on. This provides the beginnings of a shared vocabulary for the research process.
The hardware and software set up for the Motion Bank workshop was a lightweight video recording and annotation system that used 1 webcam, 3 static cameras (on tripods) and 1 following (close up) video camera. Live video annotation would be accomplished by using Piecemaker2 (PM2) based on software created by David Kern of The Forsythe Company for use during the company’s creations. PM2 is network based, meaning that several people can work together to annotate the same video material.
Our workshop was scheduled for 30–31 October 2014 to take place in the frame of the Mediating Cultural Heritage Symposium at the STA scheduled from 27 October through 1 November 2014. During planning sessions in August 2014, we agreed to arrive earlier to set up the recording space and observe the STA classes in Kunqu (one of the oldest forms of Xiqu and the one taught at the STA). Together with Tian Mansha, a renowned Xiqu performer and teacher at the STA, we would observe and select the performance material to be recorded and annotating during the two-day Motion Bank workshop. The goal of the Mediating Cultural Heritage Symposium was to explore “preservation, inheritance and innovative practice of culture heritage in the new era of technology”. The Motion Bank workshop was envisioned to provide a practical working scenario that could stimulate discussion on topics ranging from cultural heritage (Kunqu belongs to the world heritage programme of UNESCO) to new forms of creative work involving dancers and new media artists, to how these same artists might work together toward an educational goal.
During our visits to the Kunqu teaching sessions at the STA we observed teachers and students practicing the Xiqu roles they study at the STA including Sheng (male roles), Dan (female roles) and Jing (painted face male role). Based on these visits with the important support and advise of Tian Mansha, we were able to invite the Master/ Teacher Zhu Yufeng and one of his students, Guo Kaining to take part in the Motion Bank workshop. They would separately perform the Jing role of an outlaw or rebel in a horse-stealing scene, which they referred to as the “start of the second journey”. In addition, Tian Mansha gave us a lecture developed during her fellowship with the Berlin-based International research Center Interweaving Cultures in Performance[3] that focused on “breath and mindfulness” in performance. Based on this lecture and in further discussions with Tian Mansha, we started to develop a shared vocabulary around the performance forms of Kunqu, and we came up with a number of key questions to ask during the recording and live annotation session, e.g. Is there an opening gesture? What are the eyes doing? Is this a movement convention? What is its name? etc.
The plan for the two days workshop involved using the Thursday morning to record the Jing material as performed by Zhu Yufeng and Guo Kaining. The Motion Bank workshop was attended by not only the STA professors and students involved in the Mediating Cultural Heritage Symposium; but also the foreign speakers specialising in interactive digital media, heritage and dance education research (Jeffrey Shaw, Ingo Diehl, Chris Ziegler and Henning Lobin). Each performance of the material took between 4 and 5 minutes, so it could be recorded several times. In the afternoon, we reviewed this recorded material with Zhu Yufeng, Guo Kaining and Tian Mansha (and with the invited public watching and commenting), interviewing all three drawing on the key questions and beginning to add markers to the material at significant points with short descriptions, e.g. 00:05 fast spinning of the belt in the 2nd Journey to show the character is speeding up, 00:33 using the eyes to search in the dark, etc.
That evening the Motion Bank team and two translators retired to the hotel rooms to review the interviews (which had been recorded) and continue adding markers and comments to the video material. Reviewing material repeatedly and refining annotations, building up layers of new information, is an important part of the Motion Bank approach. Through this process of study and adding annotations to the video time line, new insights emerge about the recorded material. Additionally, the material from the other four video cameras (3 static and 1 following) was uploaded to the network and prepared for the next day. The Chinese keyboard (Pinyin simplified) was installed in all computers to enable easy switching between languages.
On Friday morning, we presented the results from the evening before for discussion, debate and clarification and corrections from Zhu Yufeng, Guo Kaining and Tian Mansha, with comments and questions from the invited public. Following this process, we divided the whole workshop into three groups; each was assigned a computer to continue the analysis and annotation process (in Chinese). Each computer was accessing PM2 via the network, which meant the annotations of the three groups could be viewed on the same time-line, another important principle for the Motion Bank system enabling collective and collaborative annotation work to be done. This session was followed by an evaluation of the 1.5 days, during which the Master/ Teacher Zhu Yufeng confirmed he found this method extremely useful as a way of sharing and clarifying his teaching ideas. Reviewing video material is often done in class, but this method of reviewing specific moments, to be able to do this on-line and collectively seemed to offer a new way of studying and discussing this material.
At the end of the Motion Bank workshop on Friday afternoon, we showed results of projects completed with European choreographers that demonstrated the possibility of sharing dance knowledge with the public, but also included new forms of creation using digital media inspired by dance. Motion Bank was joined for this presentation by the digital artist and dance researcher, Chris Ziegler, who has been centrally involved in several dance digitisation projects, including the first project of the choreographer William Forsythe, Improvisation Technologies. Following this, the workshop moved to the Shanghai Virtual Performing Art Lab to start the Mediating Cultural Heritage Symposium. It was summarised here by the Lab Directors, Liu Zhixin and Zhang Jingping, that the experience of the Motion Bank workshop had opened up four areas of potential for them: 1. documentation, analysis and representation of a Kunqu opera for the public as an on-line resource; 2. development and use of Kunqu teaching tools; 3. development of creative work and creative collaborations between dance and digital media; 4. preservation of Kunqu as intangible cultural heritage.
In summary, Motion Bank successfully engaged the Chinese participants, students, teachers and specialists in Kunqu in a process of documentation and analysis supported by our lightweight technical set up. The participants themselves concluded that this process can be of benefit to Classical Chinese Opera education, but can also show the different approaches of the Masters. The workshop also stimulated the discussions and debates that would take place during the Symposium to follow. The two-day Motion Bank workshop had given us the opportunity to explore how much we could extend the discoveries made within the context of Western contemporary dance, to traditional dance forms from other cultures. It was an extremely rich experience and we thank all who made it possible.
[1] Improvisation Technologies: a tool for the analytical eye (Multimedia DVD) & Synchronous Objects for One Flat Thing, reproduced (Interactive Website http://synchronousobjects.osu.edu)
[3] http://www.geisteswissenschaften.fu-berlin.de/en/v/interweaving-performance-cultures/
