Zihao Lu

Human beings are living in a divided world. A time of polarisation. From profound rooted issues and conflicts relating to racism to recent events like the pandemic. 

This project involves easing the hostilities between people with different backgrounds (cultural, racial, religious, et cetera). Using machine learning and an interactive dance installation, and a collabrative workshop series as medium to bring people closer together, find a sense of connection with each other and reduce hostility and prejudice.

On the streets, everyone puts their guards up. Within a two-meter-wide pavement, people tend to walk as far apart as they can when confronted with other strangers. We are so closed and guarded into our comfort zones, even afraid to do anything embarrassing, but when we are dancing, we seem to let go of some of those feelings and unconsciously put our guards down, especially on the dance floor. People do not mind other strangers dancing within only half a meter. The connectedness that dancing creates intrigues the author; he wants to understand why it makes us open up like that. 

Zihao combined his previous psychedelic research with the W.I.P. show project together, to keep exploring the connection between people and dancing. The aim of the combination is to merge two experiences together and enhance the sense of connectedness to the audience. During his research, he found that both have similar network systems and both provide a sense of connectedness or a feeling of ‘self-other blurring.’ He used this point as a starter, developed an interactive dancing experience and a workshop series.

In the previous W.I.P. stage, he prototyped the installation and tested it on audiences. After analysing the pros and cons, Zihao strengthened his original installation's shortcomings in encouraging multi-person interaction through his study of psychedelic networks, and explored in greater depth how to continue to bring dance floor connections into reality.