Title : RICHES Networked Performance for Cultural Heritage



Project Lead : Whatley Whatley From : Coventry University (UK)

Dates : from 2014-10-10 11:30:43 to 2015-02-04 09:35:58

Description :

Motivation and objectives :
The application of digital technologies to the different forms of transmission of Cultural Heritage (CH) is already demonstrating enormous benefits in terms of effectiveness, cost reduction, visibility and social, cultural and educational inclusion. But they also raise some very real challenges in terms of their limitations: this needs to be recognised, understood and managed by all involved in CH-related work. This proposal engages with these issues, and aims to research and experiment with digital technologies for enabling novel forms of cultural heritage production, distribution and audience engagement, with a focus on performance-based CH. The proposed project, RICHESNET, is linked to the on-going European project RICHES (Renewal, Innovation and Change: Heritage and European Society, www.riches-project.eu) and the experiences carried out by Teatro Valle Occupato in Italy (http://www.teatrovalleoccupato.it/). The RICHES project explores a looming tension derived from a lack of custodianship associated with the traditional methods of archiving. There is the risk that digital CH may be mislaid or lost, yet at the same time the role of archivists is crucial for how cultural content is made available; immediate access, re-use and reproducibility appear to be more important than sustaining access to the more static/stable records of the past. Moreover, the ease of transmission and reproduction brings increasing opportunities for content providers including cultural institutions to create new market opportunities. This new political economy in relation to digital records of CH is an important part of the RICHES research project. One of the defining features of the RICHES project, and one on which this proposal dwells, is the importance of decentring, audience participation and co-creation as some of the most important processes underpinning current CH production, distribution and reception. The RICHES project is about change; about the decentring of culture and cultural heritage away from institutional structures towards the individual; about the questions which the advent of digital technologies are demanding that we ask and answer in relation to how we understand, collect and make available Europes cultural heritage. The Teatro Valle Occupato is an utopian collective body, fighting for the dissemination of critical thinking, voicing the citizenship, the right to a dignified life and access to knowledge for all. On 14 June 2011 the professionals of the showbusiness, artists, technicians, writers, and actors occupied the Teatro Valle in Rome, Italy, in protest against cuts to culture and prevent the privatization of the theatre. Since then, the reopened theatre became an agora, a square of a social and political laboratory for active citizenship. In Europe it is a symbol of Italys cultural rebirth. The Teatro Valle Occupato, at is it called in Italian, is a busy hub of dreams, inventiveness and experimentation and since its reopening, is has created a space for new relationships, new languages, new imaginary. Lives, breathes, and makes mistakes. 24 hours a day, every day. It is also guided by the principle of self-government: a theatre designed to support the culture of those who produce and love it. Theatre, cinema, contemporary dance, dramaturgy, stage scripts, visual arts: a model for transforming the Italian system of cultural production and dissemination. The Teatro Valle Occupato puts into practice alternative economies based on cooperation, equality and self-organization of work. The legal instrument that was chosen to represent the initiative is the Fondazione Teatro Valle Bene Comune (Fondazione Teatro Valle Common Good), the first in Italy to experiment with writing its statute through an open process and amending the Constituent Assembly online and in public meetings. The focus of this proposal is on changes occurring in performance-based CH as a result of novel possibilities made available by digital technologies. By the realisation of the TNA both entities will research and experiment with low latency virtual and shared environments to conduct remote performances. This will allow us to study how we can distribute the cultural heritage content through ultra-fast wired networks and to evaluate what benefits could be brought. This will be reached thanks to initial training sessions on the usage of UHD technologies and advanced network infrastructures provided by VISIONAIRs partner i2CAT and afterwards, through the realization of a set of experiments. These activities will bring RICHES and Teatro Valle to a higher level of knowledge that will open a wider range of possibilities to accomplish with the main goals defined by RICHES and also to cooperate with external entities in order to enrich and better spread the results obtained. In this sense, with this TNA we will be able to approach directly the following objectives: Experiment with and assess the potential of new digital tools and processes to assist CH institutions to engage inclusively and productively with diverse audiences and users: co-creation, the role of the prosumer, inclusive urban planning, the role of networks in rural cultural economies. Identify skills, knowledge and technology transfer opportunities to sustain the CH sector and help it to grow and adapt to the new economic and cultural environments and will to demonstrate the value of CH across other knowledge domains. Contribute to the creation and development of networks to support cross-disciplinary and cross-domain collaboration in CH and CH-related sectors. Moreover, by conducting this TNA we will be able to collect the material and data necessary to produce the following expected outcomes: Case studies on key aspects of digital curation, preservation, creation, co-creation and dissemination of CH to give concrete illustrations of the research results; Quantitative and qualitative research-based evidence to support policy-makers in reviewing and developing new policy for enhancing CH through digital technologies; For all these reasons, this TNA will be useful for bringing together relevant data and content for re-use by creative industries in performing arts. By conducting remote performance productions entities involved in RICHESNET will be able to analyse the required infrastructures and facilities in order to enable a distributed creative virtual scenario for cultural heritage content generation. Furthermore, capitalizing on resources and contacts around RICHES and other European projects conducted by the main applicant organisation, this TNA will drive the following dissemination actions: Contribute with its results and knowledge gained to expand a Network of Common Interest created by RICHES. This Network established by RICHES partners and enlarged throughout the project lifetime will include the external partners that will be cooperating and sharing the objectives previously defined. Share the results with the EUROPENA Space Project community, focusing in the groups of Performance and Visual Arts. Here the objective is working in partnership internationally to generate new forms of cultural content and develop tools to access content. Finally, we will evaluate the possibility to carry out a practical session to showcase the results obtained in the project, to demonstrate the potential benefits of IT for the sector, and how projects like VISIONAIR can help cultural and creative entities to contribute in the re-use of CH contents. This action, to be confirmed, could be part of a continuation of this TNA.

Teams :
Situated within the School of Art and Design at Coventry University, the Centre for Dance Research/C-DaRE brings together artists and scholars, working collaboratively with partners from across the creative and cultural industries for interdisciplinary research and knowledge exchange. The centre specialises in an inclusive approach to diverse forms of artistic research in dance supported by new approaches to documentation, analysis and augmentation of choreographic creativity. Interested in dialogues across live and digital dance, and the embodied knowledge of the dance artist, research at C-DaRE is situated within a range of interrelated fields including: reflexive enquiry into forms of somatic practice; research into digital archiving and publication of live performance with a focus on dance, and the development of alternative sites for performance including screen and site-responsive dance. C-DaRE also hosts national and international dance conferences, Festivals, symposia and training programmes. These include the biennial International Conference on Dance and Somatic Practices and the annual Digital Echoes Symposium, which focuses on developments in digital archiving in relation to dance/performance. The annual Summer Dancing Festival is a showcase for leading dance practitioners and brings together participants and audiences from across the UK and frequently from overseas. C-DaRE is also the home of the Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices, published by Intellect.

Dates :
starting date : 03 February, 2015
ending date : 11 February, 2015

Facilities descriptions :
http://visionair-browser.g-scop.grenoble-inp.fr/visionair/Browser/Catalogs/DML.SP.html

Recordings & Results :
Coventry Univerity (represented by Sarah Whatley) and Centro Teatro Ateneo, Centro di ricerca sullo Spettacolo and Teatro del Valle Occupato (represented by Maia Giacobbe Borelli) are two entities with great interest in the research and exploring of the gradual adoption of technological environments in the performing arts and how the expanding of bandwidth have given rise to new forms of creative expression and space for experimentation. i2CAT is a non-profit technology centre which promotes R+D+i activities in the field of Information and Communication Technologies and Future Internet. The centre invests in a new model of innovation based on collaboration between companies, public administration, the academic world and end-users, through an open innovation environment that is characteristic of the Internet culture. I2CAT is currently exploring advanced visualization systems and offering cutting-edge technologies to culture and performing arts. The project timeline has included the following phases: Phase 1: Research and artists recruitment. During the weeks previous to the visit of both users of the TNA, several meetings had been held separately in order to prepare documentation and general arrangements. The access provider, i2CAT Foundation, prepared a document with a description of all the technologies available in i2CAT for the production and execution of performances in distributed environments. This document, along with updates on the workshops program and participation was sent to both users to get the specific knowledge beforehand. The expertise provided by i2CAT in the field of video transmission over IP networks, video/audio coding, video processing, video adaptation as well as proven capability in developing multimedia transmission tools for enabling remote collaboration using multipoint videoconference systems has contribute to the development of new methodologies and practices in virtual performance. The document described in detail the following: Low Latency AV: This platform is based on Ultragrid software and it provides low latency point to point audio and video communication. It is relevant that it may transmit a video stream coming from many different sources (SDI, webcam, IP camera, desktop share, etc.) UHD Visualization: This platform is based on SAGE and Ultragrid, it provides a visualization system to feed a grid of screens or a tiled huge multiscreen. Real Time Video Realisation: This platform is based on VideoMixer and is designed to enable video mixing for real time RTP/RTSP audio and video streams. Video Conferencing: This platform is a suite of tools (VideoMixer, MCAS and ViCoS) that provides a full video conferencing SIP system, including multi-video conferences, recording service and web streaming. Web Streaming and Transcoding: This platform is based on MCAS software and it provides a streaming web service (based on HLS and MPEG-DASH) and an on demand transcoding service to all major formats of HTML5. Take into consideration that most of them are related to real-time multimedia streaming and processing, so they may be used in several scenarios and use cases. Phase 2: workshop 'Cocreation, distributed performances and alternative content for the big screen': During two days in November (10&11 November 2014), representatives from different cultural and academic institutions in Europe (United Kingdom, Italy, Netherlands and Catalonia among others) have met to share experiences, establish synergies and explore future collaborations. The activities celebrated during the workshop can be separated in three main initiatives, described below. This event was the main support framework to run all in-site and practical activities of the TNA. 2.1. Seminar on distributed performances and alternative content for the big screen: Among the speakers who have participated in the workshop include Robert Delamere, co-founder and creative director of Digital Theatre; Andy Lavender from the University of Surrey; Maia Giacobbe Borelli from Teatro Ateneo Center; Doug Williams from BT Innovation; Sarah Whatley, dance professor and director of the Center for Dance Research (C-Dare) at Coventry University in representation of the European project Riches and the artists Marcell Antunez and Marloeke van der Vlugt, who shared their work and experiences that are taking place in this emerging sector. The near 90 participants registered (artists, teachers, technicians, researchers and students) and the 15 speakers invited in the 'Cocreation, distributed performances and alternative content for the big screen' have mapped and exposed with practical case studies the state of the art of distributed performances. In recent years, the gradual adoption of technological environments in the performing arts have given rise to new forms of creative expression and dissemination in the scenic arts; live opera, ballet and theatre broadcasting in cinemas and distributed scenarios with interactive tools that invite audience participation are emerging practices nowadays. All this information was shared with the audience to provide them with a theoretical background necessary for the following sessions. 2.2. Training session and experimentation with i2CAT technologies: During the two-day Workshop, a dedicated training session was held at the Institute of Theatre where creative and industry professionals had the opportunity to experiment with the technologies developed by the I2CAT Foundation Audiovisual Unit specially designed for the production and implementation of distributed scenarios in live performances at a demo session. Thanks to dedicated training sessions on the usage of UHD technologies and advanced network infrastructures provided by partner i2CAT and afterwards, through the realisation of a set of experiments, the activity brought higher level of knowledge and open a wider range of possibilities to accomplish with the main goals defined by RICHESnet. It was during these sessions that creatives and artists, technicians among other had the chance to discuss and conceptualize how the use of technology can contribute to preserve CH. This session was done in a very practical manner. The session where conducted was a big demo room. The audience had the chance first to see the technologies, then to test it by themselves and ask developers to better understand how it worked. 2.3. Cocreation session: One of the main activities of the workshop focused on a co-creation session where different participants interact in order to: - discuss about the creation and conceptualization of a future remote performance - test and evaluate technologies presented (mainly based on HD/UHD video streaming and mixing)

Conclusions :
A special focus on this TNA was given to provide feedback in order to define and characterize the minimum technical requirements for enabling a virtual remote scenario that can support distributed performances. Content and Data generation: To define which re-usable content is useful and to provide access to this shared content. Technology: To study the minimum required infrastructure for deploying distributed scenarios between virtual locations and connecting different distributed performance facilities, projects and initiatives. Distribution: To promote the creative re-use of digital cultural heritage in collaborative and distributed environments. Through a practical session, all participants had the opportunity to: Find and test professional audio and video hardware that should to be installed at venues and practise rooms to deliver a satisfactory user experience. Check the minimum network requirements and video codification parameters in order to set the thresholds for a high quality distributed performance. Find out how to enable the artistic and CH community to experiment and research, usingadvanced and low latency communication and audiovisual technologies and infrastructures. Through a cocreation session, all participants and the users of this TNA discuss the possibilities of networking together and plan a future distributed performance scenario, the achievements of this meeting where: A draft of the narrative of the future event was established A map of the venues/places willing to participate and collaborate with the future event showing the following nodes was drawn: o Barcelona, Spain o Coventry Uni, UK o Waag Society, Netherlands o Teatro Valle Occupato, Italy In addition, through this multidisciplinary collaboration between engineers and artists, the task will explore the preservation and transmission of performance-based CH. In particular, we will be able to provide more comprehensive answers around best practices and solutions for recording, storing and ensuring future access to it. Work will involve mapping the impact of new technologies and the changes in the process of distribution and circulation of performance practices, evaluating the way in which CH is reinvigorated, reconceptualised and revalued through novel methods to preserve, capture, circulate and recreate performances of the past and present for future benefit. This report will draw on data from on-site interviews and questionnaires that will collect participants experience in the project.




Project Images :

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