ROCKETBLOG!

“Community Projection Week”  The presentation of this project will occur over the course of one week.  Each night, Daniel Parks will facilitate the creation of a unique projection art piece on the outside of a different community center or secondary school across the Kansas City Metro.

There will be two sections to the projection content at each performance. The first section will feature video that is inspired by the local community members, who will provide material for a professional video artist to work with. Alternatively, Parks will work with an amateur video artist from the community to help them create brief, high quality content to be projection mapped onto a building in their neighborhood.

The second section of projection content will be created in real-time by active participants. A range of simple and intuitive interactive tools will be provided to the audience so they can create a unique and living canvas on their building.  This will include devices like the Xbox Kinect, video cameras, Wiimotes, Ipad, etc. used as control input devices, which will serve as a social medium to be explored for the majority of the night’s event. Parks has extensive experience working with this technology through his work with the Quixotic Fusion performance group.

The overall goals of the projection content are to be specific to the community and specific to the architecture of the provided building. The community may also add other performance elements to each evening as they desire, such as live music or dance performance. This will allow each performance to be unique to a specific community, and will create an experience that they can take ownership in.

The motivation for this project is to provide the opportunity to local communities to have their own unique experience with large-scale projection entertainments that they would not ordinarily be able to access.  Another aim is to create an event for community members to come together in celebration of the institutions that serve public needs for that area.

All communities in the KC Metro will be eligible to apply to host these events.  The final locations will be chosen to represent the greatest range of diversity in socio-economic status and geographical location. The physical nature of the building should also be suitable for a projection and/or performance area. Community applications will be evaluated based on a strong commitment by community leaders to create a successful event, and their willingness to use local outreach to create interest in the activity.

Each event will be free to the public.

About the Artist

Daniel Parks is a  professional lighting and projection artist residing in midtown Kansas City. Most of his work is with local performance ensemble Quixotic Fusion. He has been the Lighting and Projections Director with this group since 2007, and is also a freelance lighting design with other groups in the Kansas City Metro such as the Jewish Community Center, Olathe Northwest High School and Seamless Dance Theatre. 

While working for Quixotic he has honed the skills necessary to adapt to different environments at every single performance, specializing in providing customizable one-time events at any location or venue. This includes projection mapping on the Nelson-Atkins Museum in Kansas City and the Center of Contemporary Arts in Saint Louis, as well as creating original performances or supporting non profit gala events at The Midland Theatre, the Uptown Theatre, Starlight, the Wornall Bridge on the Plaza, First Friday’s MAAA stage, Hobb’s Building, Union Station, Harrah’s, Ameristar and Bartle Hall. The performances are a mixture of dance, aerial, high visual elements and a live band playing original compositions, delivering something between a rock concert, dance performance and a theatrical presentation.

In the last couple of years he became interested in creating projects that allow audience members to manipulate visuals in an intuitive manner, using items like Ipads, sensors, cameras, the Kinect, etc. as tools that can be instantly used to create visual compositions. He loves the idea of enabling the audience to craft their own visual experience. When this opportunity is provided as a surprise to the participant they are put in a situation of true discovery in  new media.

For more information, visit: http://vimeo.com/21821395