Ryoji Ikeda @ California Theatre blows my mind....

Tue, August 8, 2006 - 10:30 AM by, Jane Crayton

Walking in the cool breeze, in the fresh air, I felt alive again; my body and mind refreshed and ready to receive input. Yet I never imagined that I would have been such an important performance, even though I did not fit exactly right, tickets manifesting, everything was flowing and my vibe glowing. It was a much different feeling and crowd than Sonar; Zero One in San Jose was the ultimate Silicon Valley experience. But I didn’t let it deter me from this great perspective Ryoji Ikeda threw in my face. We were sitting center, about 6 rows back, it was perfectly balanced for the audio to reflect and reverberate from my ears to my bones. It was loud, and startling, and it was noise. A lady from the back protested, “It’s too loud” she screamed at the space of silence solicited but not granted. A book slammed down, it was almost unbearable, she screams, “It’s not suppos to hurt,” at the next pause, and the noise is scratching, ripping and tearing apart your ears, a group of people in the front shhhhhhhhh’d her. It’s silent again and just when you think she’s done, she yells, “I’m leaving,” and I hear the theatre door slam behind her. It was powerful, it was noise, it was not suppos to be nice, or soft, it was suppos to hurt and scare and wake you up and leave you shaking. At this point I am in awe, the graphics, the motion, the data was all moving and changing and creating this message of sense and nonsense, of life and death, of reflection and direction. C4I captures the world, translates it digitally and visually for you with a poetic twist and profound message. The first half of the show was brilliant and I was so inspired and happy, you could not have whipped the grin off my face. Technology was being used to translate a message about our culture, about our realities and our alter-dimensional digital worlds that run parallel. We walked out onto the posh patio with a streaming wall water fountain to catch some fresh air during the intermission that forced us out of the theatre. The atrium, patios and halls were crowded with Zero One participants tagged and labeled with their events pass around their necks. We shared a drink and quickly entered the theatre to get our seats for the second half of the show. I had no idea what to expect, but I knew it was going to be good, I just had no idea that I was about to see the best visual perspective of the universe that I have yet seen in my life. It was noise, and it was all data driven the movie named Datamatics was a totally cool life experience for me. The entire experience was awesome, the Venue, the lady screaming the Silicon Valley geeks and artist elites all surrounding us, and yet here I was, in the midst of the best audio and visual representation of our universe to date. I have been waiting, wondering, trying to fully imagine this myself for so long. My study of astrophysics extends to the dimensions of data, and chaos, reality and illusion, art and science. I sat there absorbing each detail of each sound, scratch, squeak. I was powerless in my state of absorption, I had opened up all my senses to inhale the essences of this art work, I could feel and breathe the universe around me, as Ryoji Ikeda gave us the view of our universe VISUALLY using only pure data to reveal the world in which we exist, and it was beautiful. If I ever teach an astronomy class, Datamatics would be the first film I would want all my students to watch…