Re: why dance on the web?

Jeff Miller (jgmille2@students.wisc.edu)
Fri, 08 Jan 1999 17:19:13 -0600

Amanda Steggell wrote:

> Web Dance.
> Web Dance does not exist.
> To elaborate, the term Video Dance has been roaming around since the
> eighties, and is used to describe video works involving the notion of
> dance in some way. However, a video is a video is a video. A video does not
> dance, though it can contain mediated dance material. Video Dance is
> therefore an empty label. The same applies to Web Dance.

Hmmmm...I both agree and disagree with this. true, Dance is dance, regardless
of what medium it goes through, and by refusing to limit the identification to
the medium, there is a certain freedom for the artist (much like the
liberation of the physicians who refuse to be labeled "women doctors").

However, to use the example of Video dance, there is a genre, a mindset, and a
history of dance specifically made for the camera (I could plug the IDAT
session here, but nah). It is different and distinct , and shouldn't be
discounted.

Web dance is in its infancy, to be sure...but as Richard Lord has proved, it
is possible, and is a fertile medium. Sure, bandwidth and modem speeds are a
pain...but so were portapaks and old edit suites and, for that matter,
limelights and unsprung floors. You may say it doesn't exist...but to quote
galileo: "Still, it moves..."

BTW, I really like your description of "internet dance". There was a
graphical image of the web traffic on a given day in a recent issue of Wired,
towards the back...there's a piece in that, somewhere (for us all to do in our
copious spare time, of course...)

Jeff