Friday, October 6, 2023

QUALIA - You Matter to Me, 2023

An Immersive Cinematic Art Installation directed by Laia Cabrera & Isabelle Duverger
Music and Sound design by Nana Simopoulos and Erica Glyn | Performing artist: Catherine Correa

Qualia: the properties of experience, and experiences, referred to as being phenomenally conscious

"Qualia" is an immersive video and sound installation about our longing for connection to nature,
through consciousness, awareness, and agency.


Presented at Jersey City Theater Center October 13-15, 2023
as part of JCAST 2023 and Prelude Festival 2023 - Segal Center CUNY
October 13 6-9pm, the 14th & 15th 12-6pm
165 Newark Avenue (entrance on Barrow), Jersey City, NJ
Get ticket (Free Admission)



“Qualia” is a sensory voyage where the line is blurred between the physical and the digital world, between the real and the imaginary. The gaze is a visual poem, gravitational Qualia: anxiety shaped into Surrealism, mythology, a nightmare turned fantasy, spontaneous solidarity, feelings of solitude, suspension, an embrace, the beginning of a smile, a hand falling and rising again, time and the fates.

Conceived as an immersive projection mapping design using cinematographic language and interactive dramaturgy, “Qualia” explores concepts of mental states, symbolism, and hope, creating a story that unfolds across a series of immersive scenarios drawing from the body, faces, urban patterns, nature and remains of activity. Underneath these mirrored imageries lie many stories about limits, freedom and self-perception.

An ordinary tableau becomes a dreamscape, the brain is an airport, a train rail. The mind is a magician, the body is the self, giving audience an alternative experience where they are no longer passive spectators and actively enter the very heart of the piece where ‘universal time’ continues to exist in parallel with an inner perception of time — a back door — intimately associated with our sense of personal identity and unshakable condition that the future is still open to our chosen actions.

The brain is an alchemist where memories are the bedrock of consciousness.

The piece uses choreographic language, fragmentation, bioart, color, motion, music, drama, humor, light and darkness to confound expectations, dream-like scenes and symbolic images, flattening space through animation and abstraction, or heightening the illusion of three dimensions.

The immersive experience - environmental video sculpture - is designed as a large wall with white canvases spread across, seemingly in random positions creating video spaces. Using the concept of ideasthesia, a bridge that metaphorically links rational abstractions, we open a dialogue between the different film streams - within the canvases and throughout the wall - with an original music score and sound design, extending the installation in time and space.

With the support of the Individual Artist Fellowship program provided by the Jersey City Arts Council and the Jersey City Arts & Culture Trust Fund, and the Jersey City Theater Center. Produced by Laia Cabrera & Co.



Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Projection Design and Mapping for Lachi's "Lift Me Up" music video

"Lift Me Up" is a tribute to late disability rights activist Judy Heumann, aimed at spotlighting
high-quality accessible art and Disability within a pop culture narrative. 

Lachi: RAMPD Records: www.rampd.org
Executive Producer: Lachi Music LLC www.lachimusic.com
Music Production: Lachi and Michael Herrick
Mixing/Mastering: The Pear Entertainment
Video Directors: Catriona Rubenis-Stevens and Day Al-Mohamed
Co Stars: Nell Russell, Otis Jones and Amber Galloway, Ali Stroker

Producers: Arthur Gwynne, Catriona Rubenis-Stevens, Lachi Music Music
Performers: Gaelynn Lea, James Ian, Lachi Music
ASL Performers: Amber Galloway, Aurnell Russell, Otis Jones
Audio Description Narrator: Ali Stroker
Director of Photography: Caroline Mariko Stucky
1st Assistant Camera: Eric Richardson
Editor: Jake Primmerman
Director of Artistic ASL: Amber Galloway
Projection Design: Laia Cabrera & Isabelle Duverger (Laia Cabrera & Co.)
Production Designer: JD Caesar
Special thanks to: RAMPD, Gymnopedie, Quad Studios
Audio Descriptions Sponsored by Google, maker of Lookout
ASL Sponsored by Amber G Productions
Sponsored by Google, maker of Live Caption and Live Transcribe

  

Thursday, March 9, 2023

Projection Design and Artwork for "Allerleirauh, The Musical" by Angela Masi and by Dillon Feldman, 2023​

    

   

A compassionate and witty take on the classic Grimm fairytale, Allerleirauh is the story of a genius architect who is forced to flee her homeland to protect her blind daughter. Disguised as beggars, they find work in the kitchens of a neighboring castle. With the help of a grumpy cook, a vegetarian king and an outrageous cast of characters, The Builder finds within herself the strength to face the cost of her mistakes and become the mother and queen she was always meant to be.

Directed by Catriona Stevens
Projection design and artwork by Laia Cabrera and Isabelle Duverger
Light design by Matt Steinberg - Choreography by Michael Scannelli
Cast: Adam Barr, Camber Carpenter, Paul Gary, Jeffrey Grover, Zoila N. Pinto, Sean Quigley, Yasmin Ranz-Lind, Chase Wolfe, Claire E. Dempsey, Shari Gill, Veronica Depauli, Sofia Ales
Band: Natasha Gonzalez music direction; Blair Hamrick, Katya Barmotina, Alice Levine, Vince Novellino, Dave D’aranjo, Andy Buslovich, Emma Reinhart, Steve Plesnarski

March 10-11, 2023 - Alvin Ailey Dance Theater - 405 W 55th St, New York, NY