Francesco Misceo is an experimental contemporary dancer and multimedia artist born in Modena, Italy in 1997. He acts in the field of the digital arts and performing arts by creating many forms of art, from stage performances to exhibitions combining real and virtual worlds. He placeses the human body at the heart of technological and artistic challenges and adapts today’s technological tools to create timeless poetry through a visual language based on playing and enjoyment, which breeds imagination.
His work is acknowledged for the highly holistic artistic methodology with strong digital backgrounds, which considers not only physical elements as dance, but also optical, sonar, sensorial and, above all, spatiotemporal components as part of the choreography. Based on his profound interest in choreographing time and space, he wants to spread his talent not only as a choreographer and dancer, but also as a composer, light designer, scenographer and visual artist.
Speaking specifically about your process, could you tell us a little bit about how you get creative? How do you work your way through a concept?
I tend to work in a multidisciplinary way, and my favorite part of the creative process is when I have to merge dance, film, design and music to achieve a visual storytelling. So my work is most exciting to me when I can bring these things together to tell a visual story and create some type of world that can make someone feel something.
I have three related concepts behind my work.. the first one is that every time I dance, I experience absolute freedom. I feel that my body is without boundaries and limitless. So I had to find a visual concept to express this powerful feeling and the particle system effect you see is the one I use the most to give that feeling.
The second one is the breath. We can sense breath and feel breath. We sense that breath is moving but we can’t really see it. We have an under- standing of what ti is because we feel the effect of an inhale creating volume and the contraction of our physical body as we exhale. And what Iusually ask myself in order to create these visuals is, how can we visualize the sensation of breath using the moving body ? And this is the starting point of my creative process.
The third one is the space/environment. I use dance to explore the physical design of the human body in relation to the space. Inspired by organic structures and the systems required for breathing, I orchestrate an abstract movement film that fills the space leading us through an experience of what it is to be moved by breath and to be in synch with the natural world.
As a dancer, could you tell us about how you got your start?
Dance is where I find my capability to communicate; Before knowing where dance could and would take me, I just knew that movement was offering me a way to connect to my feelings, experiences, thoughts and not only making me lose myself in it but also helping me to transform them into unspoken words. Dance allows me to connect to the scope of sensations, it’s a truly intimate act.
Most of my movement comes from a place of play and curiosity. If I stop having fun and entertaining my body, dance can take me to a very serious place in which I’m not so interested in. I’ve always loved contaminating my dancing with many styles, blending an urban dance code with contemporary dance.. and I think that before employing techniques, the question of mind, spirit or life must be considered. We don’t depend on techniques to live. The more techniques are employed, the more we put aside what is fundamental.. I try to ignore techniques and structures and focus on the spiritual. That’s what Iwant to achieve in my dancing.
In fact, approaching dance in these terms also values the idea of performance, which for me, is a mental and physical construction that the performers make in a specific time, in a space in front of an audience, and then an energy dialogue happens. This exchange between the audience and the performers is what makes the piece come alive. Ibelieve that my role as an artist is to give the audience something to think about, be able to stimulate their memory, touch their feelings and I expect to receive some sort of response back. It can be physical, verbal or energetic.
The dance code I mainly use in my videos are: Contemporary Dance, which is an innovative approach to movement that explores new concepts, dance forms and storytelling. Floorwork, which is a technique that involves movement and choreography performed on the floor. Acro-flow, that combines elements of acrobatics and dance to create a fusion of fluid movement and acrobatic skills.
Aside from the physicalities of dance, how do you express the various sensory experiences in your art?
It’s something l’ve been doing for the last 6 years and I kind of started when I first discovered Touchdesigner, a powerful visual development platform used for creating interactive and immersive experiences. It has a node-based interface that allows artists, designers, and developers to create real-time graphics, interactive installations, generative art, live performances, and more.
I was in middle school at the time and I was just like blown away by the software. It was one of the most amazing things that i’d ever seen. It was the coolest thing for me because you could just kind of create anything in your imagination and like do it on your own and the computer. So I just been working in kind of the creative field since then and I’ve always been very focused towards trying to create imaginative work by fusing dance and technology.
Movement can be so very fluid, could you describe how you elevate its beauty and meaning in a digital sense?
One of the key strengths of Touchdesigner is its real-time capabilities. It can handle complex calculations and visual rendering in real-time, making ti perfect for live performances and installations. The patch Iuse the most to elevate my dancing was created with GLSL compute shader using optical flow design, some feedback systems with particle position, velocity and color, and atomic counters. The visual design that comes out is perfect for smooth movements.
What ambitions do you have in the future when it comes to combining digital advancement tools with your choreography?
One of my upcoming projects that I am working on, which is called DISEASE, a live-media performance based on the real-time interaction between the movements of a dancer, generative graphics, sound and lights. The concept behind this project is a metaphor analyzing the phases of a disease, a disorder of human structure or function and its relationship with nature.
The visual concept, interpreted through Touchdesigner, is modified by sound frequencies and analysis of the dancer’s movements. All this is possible thanks to the real-time data processing in TouchDesigner that involves the capability to process data inputs, such as sensor data, audio signals, or external device inputs, in real-time and use that data to generate visual and interactive elements.
It offers a rich platform for exploration and innovation in both the fields of dance and data processing. In this case, we will use an optical sensor allowing the realtime tracking of every single movement of the dancer and providing a profound level of interaction. The setup has been developed consisting of a frontal projection on a semitransparent surface enabling a good viewing of digital content without canceling the figure of the dancer.
When such technologies like Touchdesigner are applied to the artistic whims of human artistry, how does it extrapolate on the message or meaning of a particular work? Would you consider it to be truly autonomous in the way it expresses a style after introducing real human input?
I believe that, as a dancer, software like Touchdesigner, which works with real-time data processing, can offer many opportunities for expression. This fusion between dance and technology is still seen as something new and authentic in both worlds. I think, for example, that the thing that makes my work special is that in my works I am both the performer/dancer and the visual artist/motion designer. There are so many dancers and so many visual artists out there but very few do both.
There is a lot of talk of how digital tools can be detrimental to artists because it can render art faster than most traditional modes while it takes human beings much longer to create the same image of the same caliber. What are your thoughts on this?
I believe that technology no doubt helps us save time, but I agree that cutting-edge digital tools, if misused, can eliminate steps in the creative process. One important thing Ialways tell myself is that software is only the medium, first you have to have an idea, without an idea the digital tools might take you to a place where you are not interested in.
What ambitions do you have in the future when it comes to combining digital advancement tools with your choreography?
One of my upcoming projects that I am working on, which is called DISEASE, a live-media performance based on the real-time interaction between the movements of a dancer, generative graphics, sound and lights. The concept behind this project is a metaphor analyzing the phases of a disease, a disorder of human structure or function and its relationship with nature.
The visual concept, interpret- ed through Touchdesigner, is modified by sound frequencies and analysis of the dancer’s movements. Al this is possible thanks to the real-time data processing in TouchDesigner that involves the capability to process data inputs, such as sensor data, audio signals, or external device inputs, in real-time and use that data to generate visual and interactive elements.
It offers a rich platform for exploration and innovation in both the fields of dance and data processing. In this case, we will use an optical sensor allowing the real-time tracking of every single movement of the dancer and providing a profound level of interaction. The setup has been developed consisting of a frontal projection on a semi-transparent surface enabling a good viewing of digital content without canceling the figure of the dancer.
