Who Cares Dancescreen work - thermal imaging (un)masking the body

Artists Caroline Broadhead and Angela Woodhouse propose their dance-screen work Who Cares as a contribution to the conference theme, specifically the notion of carnival as razzle-dazzle colours offered by thermal imaging, and the consequent (un)masking of the body. There is tension between the unreality of how the body is perceived coupled with the reality of biology accessed through this new technology. We align to the theme here as a point of transformation, of becoming someone or something else, simultaneously revealing intimacy and anonymity. Who Cares is situated between dance and visual arts, innovating through the manipulation of thermal imaging combined with movement/dance, registering the consequences of close contact, that is merging bodies through heat trace, exploring the capture of breath, and the heat transference evident in the exchange of clothes or the thermal residue of touch. Initiated by interviews with ICU nursing staff reflecting on their experiences of touch during the pandemic, these accounts prompted practical explorations using thermal video with dancers Alice Labant and Martina Conti. Focus was on the expanded boundary of the self, made visible, and the creation of potent imagery to communicate the importance of human connection in a dynamic way. It reveals the potential for painterly abstraction through the capture of heat trace and the opportunity to explore a poetic interpretation of the tactile, connecting the worlds of technology, biology and art. The work has been shown in a variety of formats from framed miniatures using iPods to large format projections and extreme wide screen.