Selfies, Dance, and Performance: A Multimedia and Multidisciplinary Collaboration

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article discusses a pedagogical and creative approach to designing a mixed-media, live dance performance. By involving undergraduate students in the process, the authors were able to examine the contemporary phenomenon of selfies and the effect of the “online self” and “mediated self” on dance performance. The performance combined the work of dance and digital media design faculty members, self-reflective contributions from students, a music composer, and a costume designer. Even the audience participated, as the students’ selfies and images of audience members taken by the dancers early in the performance were then also projected onto a media screen. Some of the choreographed movements were developed by student dancers following journaling and small group explorations of self and identity as seen in the selfies. Postperformance interviews revealed the value of complicating more traditional dance-making practices through role interdependence and of teaching the creative integration of multimedia in performance design.