Themes of technology and interaction have been woven throughout our programming since F-O-R-M’s inception. From interactive installations to multimedia dance works, to explorations of—and in—virtual spaces, we see a natural relationship between the body in motion and this branch of creation that takes movement-on-screen beyond filmmaking.

Past Festivals

Virtual Reality with Nancy Lee and Emmalena Fredrikson 2017

“We are interested in exploring what VR can offer to dance presentations by placing the audience in the centre of the performance in an immersive environment. Our process includes developing new ways of choreographing, directing, and filming for a 360 spatial environment. We shot a demo film last summer with 3 dancers and we're planning to shoot a proper film this early fall. Kiran Bhumber (composer/new media artist) is making a spatialized soundtrack for our film using 360 audio engines.” —Nancy Lee

Cipher: Interactive Installation (Workshop Presentation) 2018

Cipher is an Interactive Installation created by Brian Johnson and Company 605 that explores how communities might coalesce around issues or ideas, how they may acquire agency through this solidarity and how this process can subsequently propel new forms forward. 

The work is a double stream video that takes data from audience movement to generatively edit the two distinct but deeply connected dance films. It takes a looping form in re-imagining DJ Kool Herc’s vision of an infinite B-Boy dance battle. Movement on screen is reiterated in the place of exhibition as distinctions of audience and performer blur and modulate each other. The dialogue between embodied viewers and mediated bodies is reciprocal in terms of movement – and an exploration of this relationship is deeply encouraged throughout the work.

Featuring dancers Bynh Ho and Maleek Washington
Composer: Matt Perry

Lisa Jackson's Transmissions: The Roots of Meaning 2019

“Transmissions” is a three-part, 6000 sq ft installation where past and future collide in a visceral and thought-provoking journey that questions our current moment and explores how complex perspectives held in Indigenous languages can offer a way forward.

The multimedia environments are beautiful and eerie, familiar and foreign, concrete and magical. “Transmissions” is about our relationship with each other and the land, and it is for everyone who lives in our challenging times.

In partnership with SFU Woodward’s
Produced by Electric Company Theatre

Ralph Escamillan (FakeKnot) and Milton Lim: BLUSCRN 2020

BLUSCRN is a collection of multimedia dance works exploring the impacts and imprints of flat media and hyper marketing onto the contemporary body. By using both live and post-production chroma keying softwares to filter and replace environments, objects, and clothing, the project asserts a simultaneous operation of the body as subject and object.

In translating physical space to a 2-dimensional screen, the artists examine the techniques of live performance, popular media, and cinema; all of which have their own concepts of image and ideation. These frameworks of imagination and immersion serve as a context from which we can observe the constantly changing landscape of body politic and social marketing.

This iteration of BLUSCRN will manifest as 3 distinct short films: BLUrm, BLUbrd, and BLUprnt -- each containing a central question of how bodies behave within and transform beyond specific environments.

Daria Mikhaylyuk: Venus Art Gallery 2021

F-O-R-M 2021 featured the Opening of the Venus Art Gallery (V.A.G.), curated by Daria Mikhaylyuk.

Founded in 2021, the V.A.G. is recognized as one of the most respected and innovative visual arts institutions. The Gallery’s ground-breaking exhibitions showcase both the most progressive young artists of today and the most premium mediocre old masters of yesterday.

Our extensive public programs and emphasis on the post-truth environment all focus on the historical and contemporary representation of the Birth of Venus and all things (not) connected. The Gallery’s programs are devoted to fusing capitalism and aesthetics in the most seamless and heavenly way possible.

After more than a year of life rooted in the digital realm, we announced this commission for F-O-R-M 2021 that takes these themes as its focus, and whose process and outcome is rooted in the body’s interaction with technology. We see supporting this kind of work as a way of activating bodies in(to) the digital creative space.

Let's shape our collective digital, post-reality future together with Venus!

Jasmine Liaw: SONIC COLOUR 2022

In 2022, we piloted a new approach to this program. Now spanning two years, we aim to support artists over a longer period of time, allowing more depth and breadth to learn new skills and integrate new technologies into their projects and practices.

Year 1 - Research and Development

Year 2 - Research into the realization of the project with a presentation at our 2023 festival

In 2022, we hosted our first artist in residence, Jasmine Liaw, and her work in development SONIC COLOUR.

To highlight the research and development phase of the program, Sophia interviewed Jasmine amidst this research. 

Click here to learn more about F-O-R-M.