Roof Piece 3 screens Installation from 1973
Roof Piece Installation
The installation is projecting three films that were shot in 1973 to chronicle the performance.
Those 32 minutes 16mm films were scanned in 2K video in 2017, thanks to a grant application by TBDC permitting three projected moving images to be projected at least life size for the solo dancer on screen left and the solo dancer for screen right.
When you are close to one screen you feel the dancer is next to you, but if you pull back at a distance, in a single angle of vision you see the three screens and can compare the difference between the movement sent from the head of the line and its reception less than two minutes later to the end of the line. That permits you to understand the distortion or the absence of it depending of the movement in relation to the distance travelled.
Dancers are spread out one per street block and were positioned to be able to move and see the dancer before them and be seen by the dancer following them. Nobody could see all the dancers from one position and at most you could see 5 dancers on those Soho roofs in July 1973.
The performance Roof Piece was first performed in 1971. But the performance,
which became famous was the one performed in 1973 when it was filmed.
The installation plays in loop of about 32 minutes.
Special thanks to Anne Sophie Dunant who curated the show at Bordeaux Centreof Contemporary Art, France in late March and early April 2018.
