FARFALLE (Butterflies) is “told” by two graceful dancers, the luminous, brilliantly lit stage becomes a glowing garden that responds from every direction to their movements. Sun glints on your face and you hear the butterfly wings beat as audience members are invited to touch and experience this wondrous garden for themselves.

ARTISTIC DIRECTOR DAVID VENTURINI

TPO Italy - producers of Farfalle

Discussing the "High Tech High Touch" behind Farfalle that creates a mezmerizing show

Tell us about Compagnia TPO?

TPO is an Italian visual theatre company that creates interactive shows for children and installations for museums or art galleries. In our projects we collaborate on an international basis with engineers, graphic designers, art directors, dancers and other professionals.

How does the CCC [children’s cheering carpet] work?
It looks like a normal dance mat but underneath it we place touch sensors that react to body pressure. The sensors produce an electrical signal every time one or more spectators step onto the carpet. The result is that the movements of the spectators on the carpet activate the sounds and the images of the stage.

What can you do with the CCC to create a perceptive space?
With the CCC carpet TPO develops sensitive environments in the form of virtual gardens or art works, a perceptive space. It is a wonderful machine for a physical relationship between kids, images and sounds, and an immersive theatrical space. At the beginning the audience uses their bare feet in the place of eyes. It is through feet that sensors react; then when people feel confident they will use all their body to interact with the images and sounds they find on the carpet. Body language in this case is more appropriate to enter the artistic quality of the images and the sounds proposed, in addition to being more universal than verbal language.  Movement allows composition games between shapes, colours, sounds and objects, and all this becomes an emotional experience shared by the public. 

FARFALLE

May 31-June 5

Various Times

Variety Theatre at Performance Works

childrensfestival.ca           604.873.3311