Virtual production of Shakespeare, hyperrealistic digital humans, and Scenospace
A weekly digest charting developments across live performance, technology, and the emerging Metaverse
We're back after a brief winter break with a brand new name. Part aggregator, part independent journal, Scenospace is a weekly digest charting developments across live performance, technology, and the Metaverse. Scenospace is delivered every week to your inbox. We welcome submissions from our community, and gladly credit contributors. Submit your link and accompanying synopsis for consideration to desk@scenospace.com.
New Forms and Audiences
A live, online performance set in a virtual midsummer forest
In March, the Royal Shakespeare Company presented Dream, a live online performance inspired by A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The work featured avatars controlled by actors in motion capture suits and emerging virtual production techniques as seen last year in The Mandalorian. You can rewatch the full performance here.
Tech and the Metaverse
Into The Void: Where Crypto Meets The Metaverse
We first noted the emergence of NFTs and new creator economies in December. Here, Piers Kicks offers compelling insight into the possibilities for an open Metaverse powered by crypto.
Epic Games launches MetaHuman Creator
First announced in February, the cloud streaming app for creating hyperrealistic digital human characters is now available for early access. These new processes for producing synthetic humans have long been connected to artistic practice and research—from the automatons of the 18th century built to resemble humans and animals, to Jean Tinguely’s 1950 drawing machines, from Hiroshi Ishiguro’s life-like android Geminoid, to Refik Anadol’s AI driven data sculptures.
Entangled Histories
Manifesto of Futurist Scenography
In his 1915 manifesto Futurist Scenography, Enrico Prampolini anticipated the future of digital theater:
The stage will no longer be a colored backdrop but a colorless electromechanical architecture, powerfully vitalized by chromatic emanations from a luminous source. … From these will arise vacant abandonments, exultant, luminous corporealities … Instead of the illuminated stage, let’s create the illuminating stage: luminous expression that will irradiate the colors demanded by the theatrical action with all its emotional power. … In the totally realizable epoch of Futurism we shall see the luminous dynamic architectures of the stage emanate from chromatic incandescences that, climbing tragically or showing themselves voluptuously, will inevitably arouse new sensations and emotional values in the spectator. Vibrations, luminous forms (produced by electric currents and colored gases) will wriggle and writhe dynamically, and these authentic actor-gases of an unknown theatre will have to replace living actors
We welcome submissions from our community, and gladly credit contributors. Submit your link and accompanying synopsis for consideration to desk@scenospace.com.
Part aggregator, part independent journal, Scenospace is a weekly digest charting developments across live performance, technology, and the Metaverse. Scenospace is delivered every week to your inbox.