Touch Me Hold Me Let Me Go - A Lecture-Performance

In this solo work,

I discuss, teach, practice, perform and invite the audience into an experience of the algorithm, Touch Me Hold Me Let Me Go.

The work begins with a powerpoint presentation that tracks the development of the algorithm as a consequence of a dance with a mask carved by Wuikinuxw/Klahoose artist Bracken Hanuse Corlett. More of that story here. It then shifts and changes through a set of poems, read, embodied and activated into what is sometimes instruction, sometimes a dance, sometimes a song. Along the way, the audience is invited (but not coerced!) into participating in ways large and small. It culminates in a ritual of collective songmaking and dancing.

Here is a 5-minute version of this 90-minute work.

While it currently exists as an in-person performance, between 2020-2022, it developed through performances on Zoom.

Here is the final performance of that era.

The core of this work is a piece of text and choreography, written and performed by me; accompanied by a suite of sound works composed by Junhong McIntosh-Lee. This basic structure then can meet other collaborators in different locations. These collaborators are invited to engage with the material and to act as co-facilitators for the audience along my side

In Kuala Lumpur Feb 2023 at Five Arts Centre, I was supported by Syamsul Azhar (Lighting Design) and Kent Lee (Sound Design)

In Vancouver June 2023 at the Scotiabank Dance Centre, I was supported by James Proudfoot (Lighting Design) and Mandy Huang (Stage Manager)