Contacting Image Worlds

Description:

Contacting Image Worlds was a performance by Nina Davies that took the form of an open rehearsal by the fictional Image Syncers. The performance extended Davies’s exhibition, which centred on a single-channel video narrated through an episode of an invented podcast, What’s Sizzlin’. In the episode, investigative journalist Teagan Carroll recounts her first encounter with an Image Syncer community at the Trio Comms Hall. The performance restaged this moment, with Torien Cafferata, Kevyn Hu, Rebecca Margolick, and Simran Sachar performing as a group of Image Syncers rehearsing choreography that mimicked AI-generated renderings of human movement.

To begin, Davies’s film screened outside the Grand Luxe Hall, offering audiences the narrative context to step into the world of the Image Syncers. Before entering the performance space, audience members were invited to don ceremonial garments: grey hoodies printed with garbled, AI-generated text. These mirrored the performers’ costumes and deepened the sense of immersion into the synthetic worlds the Image Syncers attempted to reach.

Inside the Luxe, the performance was viewed through iPhones mounted on ring lights. The performers’ movements were filmed live and synchronized across the devices, allowing audiences to experience the rehearsal through the same networked interfaces the Image Syncers use to commune with AI systems. For those who preferred not to enter the space, the livestream was also available on monitors adjacent to the Luxe.

Presented with support from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Government of Canada.