Soul Leaves Her Body

Soul Leaves Her Body is an integrated-media performance synthesizing theatre, dance, live video, music, and cinema. Inspired by a 13th-century Chinese story about a young woman who tears her soul from her body in order to pursue her destiny in the city, the performance explores the soul-body relationship in today’s networked, electronic culture. Director and video artist Peter Flaherty used the residency to continue his experimentation with custom-designed video interfaces and new techniques for integrating detailed choreography with live cameras. By manipulating such things as the tempo and perspective of the live camera imagery in real-time within the computer, Flaherty worked on creating an advanced visual bridge between physical action on-stage and pre-recorded cinematic imagery.  The goal was to create a live event that is a hybrid of high-production filmic vision and intimate, theatrical performance.

Flaherty’s work has been seen in theatres, galleries, and museums internationally, and has collaborated with The Builders Association, Complicite, Francois Girard, Chen Shi-Zheng, Basil Twist, and Bang on a Can.