KoLab Days: Dance Machine

In the organizer's words:

"Dance Machine" is motion capture & choreography, sonification & improvisation, AI tracking & movement patterns. Dance Machine is the theme of the first KoLab Days 2025: Can machines be used artistically as an extension of the physical body? What new possibilities arise when tracking is combined with theater, dance and performance?
How can we work creatively and conceptually with the new possibilities to bring digital and physical worlds closer together?

Dance Machine (KoLab Days) invites artists from fields such as theater, dance, 3D, sound, music and creative coding to explore these questions together. With workshops, performances and artist talks, we will dive into topics such as motion patterns, body tracking, dance visualization and dance sonification. Workshops will be offered for MaxMSP, Unreal Engine and p5.js, among others. Afterwards, we invite all interested parties to our networking evenings on the respective days. More information on koproduktionslabor.de or on Instagram @koproduktionslabor.

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Embodied Poetry Workshop

Friday 09.05.2025 - 15:00 - 18:00 h

What is the relationship between body and words, between movement and language?

Can we understand language as something dynamic and alive?

This workshop explores the intersection of programming, poetry and movement. Using open source programs such as p5.js and machine learning, participants can experiment with different techniques to develop projects that combine body tracking and text.

The workshop is aimed at artists who work with movement, poetry or programming and are interested in combining and exploring other disciplines for artistic installations, interactive performances, net art or live coding.

Language: English (flexible German also possible)

Location: Digital co-production lab

Date: 09.05.2025

Time: 15:00 - 18:00

Host: Florencia Alonso (Flor de Fuego)

Previous knowledge: No knowledge required. Please bring a laptop.
Pre-registration, as places are limited: info@koproduktionslabor.de

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Hybrid Encounters - A Virtual Reality Dance Experience - Anna-Carolin Weber & Tobias Kopka (VR Dance Club)

Friday 09.05.2025 - 18:30 - 23:00 hrs

In this performative installation, visitors are invited to experience extraordinary dance experiences: Invisible movement sculptures from past dance encounters are made visible through new movements. By putting on VR glasses and headphones, visitors enter a dark, previously invisible space. There they encounter a track of movement that weightlessly fills the virtual space as a sculpture. This is not the only invitation to dance. In pairs, they take turns dancing, drawing and observing. Accompanied by a feeling of immediacy, visitors immerse themselves, discover how others have moved, "swim" with 3D sculptures and are with themselves and yet not alone. There are non-verbal encounters with dances long past and new play acquaintances.

The installation, supervised by two performers, runs in a loop and invites visitors aged 12 and over to become players in the virtual reality dance experience for 12-15 minutes. No dance or technical experience is required to participate.

Artistic direction: Anna-Carolin Weber & Tobias Kopka

Dramaturgy: René*e Reith

Sound & DJ-ing: Philip Kühn

Technical Artist: Phillip Dittmann

Artistic collaboration: Helena Miko, Jasper Gather, Marlon Brodda, Max Kolb, Alessandro De Matteis

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Artist Talk with Anna-Carolin Weber, Tobias Kopka & Emil Theodor Felhofer & Networking Event

Friday 09.05.2025 - 20:30 - 24:00

In the Artists Talk we will discuss the artistic development process of their projects with Anna-Carolin Weber, Tobias Kopka & Emil Theodor Felhofer. How do they explore the interplay of dance, choreography and digital technologies in their art? And what challenges and opportunities do they encounter in the process?

Directly after the Artist Talk, there will be a networking event to exchange ideas with other artists and institutions.

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Untitled (movement and sound) - Performance - Emil Theodor Felhofer

Friday 09.05.2025 - 19:30 - 20:00 hrs

A machine stands in the middle of the room, sparse spotlighting envelops it. Cables, flashing lights, a microphone. Next to it lies a body. From the loudspeakers distributed around the room comes a sound that moves through the space. A repetitive pattern that goes round in circles. The audience is invited to move freely around the room.

The body begins to move and the sound changes with the movement. Electronic drum sounds can be heard, triggered by movements. Hip-hop rhythms that collapse again and again, like the person on stage.

A game between dancing with the music and fighting against the sound begins. Who moves whom? The person the sound or the other way around?

"Untitled" (movement and sound) is a transdisciplinary project between sound art, dance and sensor technology. With the help of acceleration sensors and Eurorack modules, I am building a system of sound generation that is controlled on the one hand by my movements and on the other by random algorithms.

In an approximation of man and machine, I try to achieve a coexistence with the playing partner on stage, the modular synthesizer next to me. I look for the human, the vulnerable and the imperfect in electronic sound. I look for the mechanical, repetitive and glitchy in human movement.

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Live Motion Capture in Unreal Engine

Saturday 10.05.2025 - 12:00 - 14:30

Movements become data, data become images - and the body becomes the interface between the physical and digital world. Using live motion capture in Unreal Engine, dance and choreography are transferred to virtual spaces in real time.

In this workshop, we will work with the Rokoko Smartsuit Pro II and explore the art of digital physicality: what new possibilities of expression arise when movement merges with interactive digital environments? The focus is on experimental work with live motion capture. How are movements precisely captured and transferred live into an engine? This creates digital avatars that act as mirrors, extensions or independent beings on stage.

This workshop is aimed at dancers, choreographers, performers, digital and media artists and anyone who wants to digitize movement. Previous knowledge of Unreal Engine is helpful, but not essential - curiosity about the interplay of body, technology and space is sufficient.

Language: German (flexible English also possible)

Location: Digital co-production lab

Date: 10.05.2025

Time: 12:00 - 14:30

Host: Timo Sodenkamp & Laurin Bürmann

Previous knowledge: no knowledge required. Please bring a laptop.

Pre-registration, as places are limited: info@koproduktionslabor.de

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Embodied Soundscapes Workshop

Saturday 10.05.2025 - 15:00 - 18:00

Description:
Sound is movement, movement is sound! Discover how motion tracking can be used to control, manipulate and generate sounds and music. Instead of moving to sounds, you perform the soundscape yourself. The result is an interactive dialog between body, movement, computer and sound. In the workshop, various technical and creative implementation options in the programs Max/MSP, p5.js and Ableton will be presented and tested in practice.

The workshop is aimed at all interested creative professionals who would like to use sound and music interactively in projects. Previous knowledge is helpful, but not required, as the concepts presented are more important than the actual implementation.

Language: German (English also possible)

Location: Digital co-production lab

Date: 10.05.2025

Time: 15:00 - 18:00

Host: Fabian Bentrup & Michael Nguyen

Previous knowledge: no knowledge required. If you want to patch live, please bring a laptop with Max/MSP, Max4Live license or installed demo version.

Pre-registration, as places are limited: info@koproduktionslabor.de