Edit the Distances

Joana Chicau

Artist Statement

In the Theatre of Re_Sources you are welcome to enter and explore the main stage and the backstage.

#Backstage
A landscape of scores or a “scorescape” for the performance piece “Edit Distances”, written in web programming languages, such as JavaScript, inter-weaved with choreographic thought and imagination.

#Main Stage
Where you will find a recording of“Edit the distances” a live coding piece enacted in a special webstage: @maps/space/ moon/.. The web browser serves as MainStage for a series of a actions written in Javascript and triggered by the performer and coder Joana Chicau.

In computation linguistics “Edit distance” is a string metric operation, the edit distance between two words is “the minimum number of single-character edits (insertions, deletions or substitutions) required to change one word into the other.” [more information at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edit_distance]. This piece explores the distance between words and its meaning, the space and the text, objects and functions, language, technique and imagination … [see full score: on the backstage].

This piece is part of an on going research project which investigates notations systems from various somatic practices, and explores the different {performative} outcomes cross media and how conditions change through affective interfac(ing) of bodies and technologies. Read more: https://jobcb.github.io.

Project Websites

↳ https://jobcb.github.io
↳ http://internetmoongallery.com/archive/JoanaChicau/Theatre_of_reSources.html

Video Documentation

Artist Bio

Joana Chicau [PT/NL] is a designer, coder, researcher – with a background in classical & contemporary dance – currently based in The Netherlands. Her trans-disciplinary research project interweaves programming and web environments with performance and choreographic practices. Chicau has been researching the intersection of the body with the constructed, designed, programmed environment, aiming at widening the ways in which digital sciences is presented and made accessible to the public. She has been actively participating and organizing events with performances involving multi- location collaborative algorithmic improvisation, open discussions on gender equality and activism.