Y Digital?
At Pilot Theatre we have been exploring and working with emergent technologies for the last fifteen years, and in a way I find the term digital a little misleading. After all we have all had digital technologies for years - CDs are digital and have been around for 30 years. We had DAT (Digital Audio Tapes) for touring our sound in the 80’s, as well as mobile phones from the early 90’s. So in terms of the current buzz phrase of digital opportunities, I prefer to use a broader term which we have coined as an ‘online strategy’.
What we are talking about here is about connectivity and communication. So whether it is mobile devices that are also phones, computers, and the internet, we are essentially exploring the whole concept of ‘engagement’, and the opportunities to extend and develop this through an online strategy.
Engagement is a Two Way Process
Engagement is a Two Way Process. In this way it echoes the whole concept of what web 2.0 has to offer. The ability to upload as well as download. The ability to connect and feedback, the ability to interact and the therefore deepen the relationships that are created.
What this means in real terms for organisations is that the central core of our work, ie live performance, is at the heart of what we do. In fact this live event is key to the possibilities that the online world has to offer. The Internet is of course also a live environment, and as such offers us parallels to our work. Around the core work we place a website with interactive upload facilities, RSS feeds and feedback facility. From this you can then add a series of platforms that are right for you and your organisation and your audience. So they might include some of the following – YouTube, Bebo, MySpace, Facebook, Second Life, Twitter feeds, Wikipedia links, iTunes downloads, Mogulus Streaming TV.
These enable the points of engagement and ultimately lead back to you and your work. After an initial contact it is the ensuing relationship that is important. The place you first met ceases to be important, it is the ongoing enrichment of the engagement that matters.
Connect and Stream
So the ability to connect and stream our live work is now possible. To reach audiences that would be unable to access our work. To some this sounds heretical, as this event is not the same as being there. No one is pretending it is, but it is still a live event that can be shared, commented on, reacted and engaged with. It is not the same, it is different. The live performance still has to happen, and the worse thing that can be said is that more people end up seeing and engaging with you and your work.
This is of course already happening, and leading Arts Organisations are already delivering this. The New York Met Opera and The Berlin Philharmonic are leading the way. At Pilot we too have streamed a live performance. So, as I have often said, the Genie is out of the bottle, and it won’t be going back in…so this stuff is here with us and it can only increase.
So imagine that your work can be seen on a global platform, and you can engage and chat live with those groups who want to engage with you is very exciting for artists.
Of course there are hurdles, but in a way, when talking pictures came out the silent movies hung around for a short while before the people and artists working on those became part of the new evolving process. This is the same for all of us. We are all part of this new evolving process, and to get on the boat and start the journey is what we all need to do. It is about discovery, learning and development. As artists that sense of discovery is at the core of what we do. The toolbox or the palette has just got bigger, that’s all.
Digitally Native
I don’t buy the whole notion of exclusivity that is often levelled at this field of work. The hard facts are that most young people by the age of secondary school are all owners of handheld mobile devices that have more processing power than the Lunar Landing vehicle and the whole operation guiding the moon landings. So in terms of being digitally native, they most certainly are. This is their world and they are not fazed by the technology. For them this is the norm, this is how it is. So we have to recognise that this is here to stay. We can learn from our audiences and the groups we make work for, by and with. The fact that a 15 year old on placement built our MySpace presence, or that we have linked up with a University to help develop our Second Life hub are part of the whole new wiki based world, where you don’t have to do it all on your own…there are people out there who want to engage and develop the work with you.
Get on the boat, there has never been a more exciting time to be an artist…
This is the first in a TYA – UK series of articles entitled: Sharing Practice