| Don't look at the idoru's face. She is not flesh, she is information. —William Gibson, "Idoru" Mindoru: I started this with a gesture that I have repeated. Rala: Today I drilled a hole in my head so as to get Permanently high. It may be my celestial eye that I found. Mindoru: Is it possible to be a gal on the go, in a culture on the decline? Rala: <processing> Idoru is a playful piece of improvisational internet theatre, an on-line meeting and collaboration between digital personae Mindoru and Rala Froct. Within virtual enviroments created using webcam and java, two performers (one based in Oslo and one in Toronto) interact with each other by creating live compositions of image and text from within a browser window. Idoru broadcasts are carried out in cooperation with musicians, computer programmers, artists and cultural institutions throughout the globe. As Idorus, we subcribe to the belief that the net is not only a medium, but also a space that is based on communication. Idoru developed from the desire between artists Amanda Steggell and Michelle Teran to collaborate on a project. Net space is used to facilitate this collaboration by providing a logical solution to the issues of geographical distance. |
| "Saw mindoru and rala do their international cyberart thing the other day. pretty nice. I kept switching back to it as I did my work. verbally, you're kind of in your own worlds, but i liked the non sequitur feel of it." –Hugh Siegel, New York "What first struck me was the combination of different programs: Two Netscape windows with the two women, IRC, Real Audio ,ivisit. I didn´t know that you could do it that way. That was important to see and opens so many possibilities – and that it was done from different physical locations. Also that you lifted text from the irc/ivisit into the images of the two women. I took same time before I realised or understood this cooperation or interaction between the different programs and different participants, but when I finally did I thought – smart ! With that I think I mean that it was joyful (to watch/ participate). It seemed more to be an idea of perfoming something, presenting, telling a story than using the technology and create an activity (as an excuse) to use the technology. It seemed to me that the idea "inside" of the performance was what most interested you than the "outside " (technological) constructions.That you created a perfomance with a contents that is important to you as persons – individuals, based in your soul and bodies – and this internet perfomance was oneof many – ways of expressing that feeling,idea. –Kjell Hanson, Helsinki I like the contrast between Mindoru's still and Rala's stills in this show, you're dealing with time in such a different manner, it creates a tension I really like. When you look at a painting, the viewer takes his/her time to read it,. In video, the artist controls the time. In Rala's picts, you wait for the next one to give it sense, like in a cartoon. In Mindoru's picts, they are more like painting, they contain their time in them. –Ellen Røed, Trondheim I took some pix of what I got to see they were fun – D, United Kingdom. I have been an Idoru for some time, since mid-97. But I didn't know there was a word for it until a few weeks ago. – Joy Reid, Newark, |