Motions

Motions by Hazel Smith (text), Will Luers (image and coding), and Roger Dean (sound) is conceived as a multimedia web book, and optimized for swiping and scrolling on tablets and computers. It is also a performance piece. It is programmed in HTML 5/Javascript. Motions takes human trafficking and contemporary slavery as its focus. Human trafficking is an accelerating form of crime and is a world-wide problem. It is one of the darker outcomes of globalization, the breakdown of the nation-state, and increasing ease of travel. Static and moving, variable and sequential, the piece presents image and text fragments from different genres: documentary, journalism, poetry and narrative. These fragments are programmed to evoke the subjective experience of enslavement in motion. The sound is constructed as an interactive mosaic. It includes musical transformations of train and plane journeys. It also features two compositions that use instrumental, timbral, rhythmic and harmonic devices characteristic of very different parts of the world. These materials are compositionally transformed with electroacoustic music techniques, including a range of algorithmic compositional devices. The sound is optimally delivered in 4 channels, but can also be delivered in stereo. Motions was the outcome of an Australia Council for the Arts Digital and New Media Writing Grant, awarded in 2012. (Source: ELO Conference)