Viewmaster

Heike Langsdorf, Laurent Liefooghe & Ula Sickle
Performance: 45 min (2007-2008)

“The viewmaster explores pre-cinema technology using a well know optical illusion called the 'pepper’s ghost effect’. The viewmaster proposes an archaic cinema - one that uses live images in the form of reflections versus projected ones.”

Since the invention of projection in the late 19th century, film has become practically synonymous with the cinema or movie theater. Modeled after the traditional theater dispositive, the place where films are shown is a divided space: on the one hand is the screen, acting as a window onto an imaginary depth, and on the other, the auditorium, acting as a single, shared point of view, occupied by an audience that sit immobile in the dark.

The viewmaster reconfigures this traditional set-up, proposing a cinema where auditorium and screen are reversible and where multiple view points are possible. The viewmaster makes use of light and reflection to create an ever changing array of moving images.

Concept: Heike Langsdorf, Laurent Liefooghe & Ula Sickle / Performance: Heike Langsdorf & Ula Sickle / Architecture: Laurent Liefooghe / Sound design: Peter Connelly & Laurent Liefooghe / Light design: Ula Sickle, Laurent Liefooghe & Hans Meijer / Production management for Rebecca September vzw: Natalie Schrauwen / Co Production: KC Netwerk Aalst, Kunst-Werk / f,r,o,g,s – OS / With the support of: Nadine, wp Zimmer and the Flemish Minister for Youth, Culture, Sport and Brussels Affairs.

Première: 05-09-2007 and 20-10-2007 Netwerk / Center for Contemporary Art / 14-02-2008 Dedonderdagen, de Singel, Antwerp / 30-08-2008 and 31-08-2008, 05-09-2008 and 06-09-2008 Kaaitheater, Brussels / 08-10-2008 and 9, 10 &11-10-2008 Almost Cinema, Vooruit, Gent / 26-10-2008 until 30-10-2008 Performances, Teatr Nowy, Warsaw / 03-08-2009 until 07-08-2009 Performances, Theater aan Zee Festival, Oostende / 02-02-2010 Huis a/d Werf, Utrecht

Installation: 15-09-2007 until 20-10-2007, Netwerk / Center for Contemporary Art & 07-10-2008 until 17-10-2008 Almost Cinema Festival, Vooruit, Gent