Quintessence is an audio-visual performance that combines the new media practice of Boštjan Čadež and the performative body of Tatiana Kocmur. The body of the performer is covered in LED lights, which respond to her movement. The body’s movement generates visuals and sounds through the help of sensors. A series of movements are combined into an animated image, supported by a video projection.
Quintessence discusses the various ways of embodying in a world of technological progress. It offers reflections on what is to be a contemporary human, how one fits into a space, and what is the human’s relation to other things. In the foreground of the performance is a cyborg – a cybernetic organism, a hybrid between a machine and an organism, a being of social reality (the live social relations, which are our most important political constructs), and imagination. The live dialogue between the body or the Self (of the artist), technology (the LED light-covered costume) and the surroundings (projection, the space, the spectators) represents a field of transformation and fusion of the dualisms of mind and body, woman and man, human and machine.
The quintessence of humanity is connectedness. A cyborg based on equality must become our ontology.