hello all; last night I witnessed an unusual opening, right in midst of a rainy windswept dark countryside in a small village called Long Buckby (Northamptonshire): "Motion at the edge", a program of dance/video/performance screenings, curated by Anna Douglas, having its premiere in an old building that used to be the Assembly Hall, a chapel-like architecture with beautiful wooden floorpanels and a magical ambience, except that these historical Assembly Rooms are now the house of an architect, who opens his private living room up for 5 weeks, exhibiting a collection of unusual films which, at first sight, look not at all like dancevideos or videodance. The artists included are: Rosemary Butcher/Martin Otter, "Vanishing Point" Gina Czarnecki "Infected" Chris. Dugrenier, "Ascendance" [with Aerobatic pilot Julian Murfitt] David Hinton, "Birds" Grace Ndiritu, "Arrested Development" Katharina Mayer, "Romanz" Not all of these screen-works are new, "Romanz" for example dates back to 2000, the others are more recent, but they have been re-worked or are now re-sited (having moved from earlier video or film installations to a single screen projection). The new context in which they are seen now, in this old but renovated architecture of the private-public house, and the constellation of a program that conjoins these very different films, provides room for discussion, especially if "dance" here is really not foregrounded or even perceivable in the manner in which we may tend to think of dance for the camera or videodance. I know that are many here on this list who are interest in dance and film, i wish i could tell you more about what i felt last night, observing the cinematic choreographies of these different artists and artist-collaborators. There is no website, so I can only take my memories with me from the village, meeting all these fine people there last night, chatting with the filmmakers and guests, laughing along with the pilot, who explained his maneuvers to me (he first visualizes his aerial aerobatic movement sequences on the ground, so the filmmaker starts off with Murfitt rehearsing - in a green meadow - how he will fly the plane..... Then the film shifts upward, and "flies" into the air and becomes an aerial dance itself.... The other remarkable work, along with Grace Ndiritu's curious and subtle ritual performance, only her feet visible in the dark, a tiny fire burning on the ground, is Gina Czarnecki's equally strangely mesmerizing digitally-modified spiralling body (danced by Iona Kewney), a dance - illusory filmed motion - that cannot be, but is generated digitally and thus moves like dance, and yet, even if moving impossibly, becomes utterly direct, naked and close, as well as poetic, far out (in the current worlds of hybrids, bioarttech and genetically engineered creaturegamelandscapes) and not easily graspable, interpretable. Go and see the show if you are in the UK. Those of you coming to Nottingham at the end of year to attend the Digital Cultures Lab and Symposium (www.digitalcultures.org) -- - we may be able to get the Arts Council England (who underwrites this exhibition) to let us screen the works again at that occasion. regards Johannes Birringer www.digitalcultures.org This email is intended solely for the addressee. It may contain private and confidential information. If you are not the intended addressee, please take no action based on it nor show a copy to anyone. In this case, please reply to this email to highlight the error. Opinions and information in this email that do not relate to the official business of Nottingham Trent University shall be understood as neither given nor endorsed by the University. Nottingham Trent University has taken steps to ensure that this email and any attachments are virus-free, but we do advise that the recipient should check that the email and its attachments are actually virus free. This is in keeping with good computing practice.