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Pic by Emma Grima

Ĭichti@ ○ sWitches

(Cyber)performance where we dance to liberate and heal—our movements are translated through a vaginal sensor, which affects lights and visuals within the installation. We celebrate the sun and activate our fire.

Created with the support of het Stimuleringsfonds Creative Industrie

2023

Format transmedia dance performance, cyber-performance and installation

Software Arduino IDE + ESP-NOW, Arduino IoT Cloud, TouchDesigner, VPN Hamachi, OBS + vdo.ninja, Twitch

Media dance performance, music, wearable electronics (EMG muscle reader, vaginal and skin electrodes, Arduino UNO and ESP32, Electrical Muscle Stimulation device), textiles, metal structure, mirrors, video projection, light design

Concept, creation, technology, and performance by sWitches (pamela varela, Ines DeRu, ella hebendanz)

Concept, technology, and performance with Marlot Meyer

Dance, performance, and dramaturgy with Fazle Shairmahomed

Costume design with persophino

Technology with Lucien Nicou

Music “Vesnianka”by mala herba (zosia holubowska)

Visuals by ella hebendanz and Adam Centko

Special thanks to georgina pantazopoulou, Tim Schütze, Maarten Keus, Lars Dorren, Morgan Catalina, Ine Gevers and the CA team :)

Exhibited at

“COME ALIVE” Muntgebouw, Utrecht, NL, 2022

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Ĭichti@ is a transmedia live/cyber dance performance and installation, where the senses of the audience are exposed to an ecstatic, climatic, orgiastic encounter with our extended bodies. Addressing the objectification and oppression that society puts on the body, together, we use the power of dance to fight, liberate, and heal. Our movements are translated through a vaginal EMG muscle sensor, which activates the installation and affects lights and visuals within the environment.

I also use this sensor in the projects exquisitely extreme and transcendence - trance ‘n dance.

Pics by Gert Jan Van Rooij

Pic by Marlot Meyer

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The ritual is a celebration of the nourishing power of the sun—inspired by the summer solstice rituals—where the sensual force of its rays is channeled through our pelvic floors, activating our fire. The viewer becomes part of a sensorial journey that transcends our physical, spiritual, and digital worlds.

The longest day of the year has been celebrated throughout history, often by dancing and singing around bonfires, which symbolize the sun, to channel its energy and ensure a supply of light for all life. Interestingly enough for our research, there have been certain traditions in Europe where a figurine of a witch is burned alongside the bonfire, to “protect” the community against evil spirits and “witches”, a consequence of the medieval witch hunts.

Pics by Emma Grima

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Ĭichti@ serves as a medium to demonstrate net-ktar, a cyber-instrument that captures (bio)data from bodily inputs to be sent online. We created it to enable us to connect to our creations using telepresence, therefore, crossing the boundaries of reality and virtuality, and building a relationship between these spaces for our performances. Both live and cyber performances use the same components in activating the space; however, with the cyber-instrument, we are able to connect to the web, automating our machines, sounds, and visuals from a distance, be it a few meters to a thousand kilometers.

The term net-ktar is inspired by the words “connect”, which is the act of bringing together,
“nectar”, which is a sugary fluid secreted by plants and, in Greco-Roman mythology, the drink of the gods, and by “network”, which is a system of interconnected members. The k indicates disruption, inspired by the Spanish squatting scene OKUPA and by magick, differentiating itself from performance magic.

Pic by Emma Grima

Pic by Marlot Meyer

Technological system in TouchDesigner

Pic by Marlot Meyer

Pics by sWitches

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The technological set-up is based on a TouchDesigner patch that connects our three vaginal sensors (plus their respective wireless ESP32 micro-controllers) to the LED strip (chapter one), the three spot lights (chapter two), and the projection (chapter three). For
the cyber-performance, we added a VPN connection that allowed us to affect the same
technologies from the distance. This is the main system we used for net-ktar. During our
research, we found another interesting method to use telepresence and affect our creations from a distance with the use of the Arduino IoT Cloud, an online platform where it is possible to connect Arduino-supported devices through the web.

In collaboration with Marlot Meyer, we created a system where we would electric-muscle stimulate her through the movements captured by our vaginal muscle reader and sent to her. Subsequently, the shocks produced on her body would make her move, therefore, activating an accelerometer placed on her core, which would then move the mirrors in the room and reflect our beams of light around the space without us being there, replacing our physical presence.

This chain of feedback interactions symbolizes for us the network of sXsterhood we dream of. By means of cyberfeminist actions, we infiltrate a space that was born from war and patriarchy: the Internet. The four of us, women or FLINTA* people working with technology, see it urgent to create new ways to interact with and through the Internet, ways where we are more present, less isolated, and more bodily connected.

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Ĭichti@ ○ sWitches

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