In the Groove
Goldsmiths MA Design Show / London Design Festival
Dance is an extreme form of expression where the torso and limbs cooperate with music, emotion and the environment. Meanwhile, interactive design is a process that incorporates a user through the functions of a service, where a design offering actively shapes the user’s memory and their engagement. This project aims to explore how the medium of dance might effectively reinforce the intensity of engagement in interactive design.
Dancing is a flow where sentiment is interpreted. Dance can either be an elaborate choreography or a series of improvisational movements, and interacts with the audience, and environment. Most dance is accompanied by music, and the flow of bodily reflection of that music may arise from or focus on different musical features. For example it might focus on the lyrics, or on the beat. Dance is a nonverbal approach to communication, where every movement the dancer produces, through the coordination of their torso, limbs and joints, conveys messages that are at times under the dancer’s conscious control, while at other times unconscious. In this project, through the association of dance with interactive design I demonstrate how design can play a role in increasing human engagement through digital services. I propose that dancing is an expressive behaviour of the human body that enacts both physical relaxation and excitement. I also believe that interactive design provides a process for offering information to and receiving responses from a user. Furthermore, I make use of the ephemeral characteristics of dance; a visible form that exists in the real space but ceases to exist after the action has been performed. These characteristics seem to fit into the environment of a virtual platform. For that reason, ‘In the Groove’ offers a digital platform designed as an interactive medium, aiming to create an environment in which each dancer is encouraged to develop the capability to effectively involve the sensibility of their audience, via extreme, emotional and attitudinal performances. I take the exhibition of this design as an opportunity to explore the intensity of the user’s engagement across different factors and aspects, in order to develop an understanding of the relationship between dance and interactivity.
Dancing is a flow where sentiment is interpreted. Dance can either be an elaborate choreography or a series of improvisational movements, and interacts with the audience, and environment. Most dance is accompanied by music, and the flow of bodily reflection of that music may arise from or focus on different musical features. For example it might focus on the lyrics, or on the beat. Dance is a nonverbal approach to communication, where every movement the dancer produces, through the coordination of their torso, limbs and joints, conveys messages that are at times under the dancer’s conscious control, while at other times unconscious. In this project, through the association of dance with interactive design I demonstrate how design can play a role in increasing human engagement through digital services. I propose that dancing is an expressive behaviour of the human body that enacts both physical relaxation and excitement. I also believe that interactive design provides a process for offering information to and receiving responses from a user. Furthermore, I make use of the ephemeral characteristics of dance; a visible form that exists in the real space but ceases to exist after the action has been performed. These characteristics seem to fit into the environment of a virtual platform. For that reason, ‘In the Groove’ offers a digital platform designed as an interactive medium, aiming to create an environment in which each dancer is encouraged to develop the capability to effectively involve the sensibility of their audience, via extreme, emotional and attitudinal performances. I take the exhibition of this design as an opportunity to explore the intensity of the user’s engagement across different factors and aspects, in order to develop an understanding of the relationship between dance and interactivity.
