Indexical presents two multimedia performances that blur the lines of performance, language, movement, and composition. On Structure (Natacha Diels and Jessie Marino) presents their latest work “The Portal,” a fully staged multimedia performance created, designed, and performed by the duo. Chris Peck is a composer, computer musician, and improviser presenting a new work for projection and sound.

On Structure: The Portal

This work of choreographed performance rituals uses live electronic sound, video projection, and DIY animatronics to stage a joyfully chaotic world which use folkloric songs, televised dramas, and amusement park scenography to tell the hidden mythologies of the Uncanny Valley. The Portal is a performance platform; part Video Game, part Ritual Alter, part Twilight Zone. On stage, the two heroines are jostled between the analog and digital worlds - preparing, practicing and dismantling their choreographed rituals as they move through different visual mediums, electronic sound worlds, and dreamscapes. Their playful actions respond to, mimic, or comment on their visual surroundings creating playfully menacing dramatic spaces where the line between reality and virtual reality is flickering in and out of focus. On Structure is Natacha Diels and Jessie Marino.

Chris Peck

Chris Peck is a composer, computer musician, and improviser who often collaborates with contemporary dance and theater artists, including David Dorfman, John Jasperse, RoseAnne Spradlin, Jeanine Durning, Mark Jarecki, Abby Yager, Ming Yang/Dance Forum Taipei, and Beth Gill. Recently he has collaborated on numerous pieces with choreographer Milka Djordjevich, including MASS at The Kitchen this April. Peck performs as an improviser and multi-instrumentalist with Crystal Mooncone along with Jon Moniaci and Stephen Rush. The trio recently completed a California tour including performances at CCRMA (Stanford) and the Center for New Music in San Francisco as well as workshops with music and dance students at UC Santa Barbara. Peck collaborated with Deke Weaver and Jennifer Allen on Land of Plenty in 2008-2010, and made music for two installments of Weaver’s Unreliable Bestiary: Elephant in 2010-11 (performing in the premiere at the Stock Pavilion in Urbana as well as subsequent iterations at the Sundance Film Festival and Salt Lake Arts Center) and Wolf in 2013. Chris is currently working on several projects with Brussels-based choreographer Eleanor Bauer, including a recently premiered commission for the “This Is Not A Pop Song” project of the Belgian new music ensemble Ictus. He completed a Ph.D. in Composition and Computer Technologies at the University of Virginia in May.

Indexical’s Santa Cruz concert series is made possible through generous support by Arts Council Santa Cruz.