Variations V (1965) took the pulse. Conceptually, collaboratively, and technically it established a standard and continues to provide a touchstone in art & technology and multimedia performance.
Cage removed the individual ego from the traditional hierarchical structure of composition and established a process through physicality. The intense group dynamic of the piece is focused in the dancer as the medium, in the sense of one who stores, transmits, channels or functions as a tool used to store and deliver information or data. The pure instinctual physicality of dance becomes the compositional tool for the piece, and the dancer also becomes the conduit; a trigger of circuitry and a human antenna able to uncover the signals in the space and performance. Concurrently, the audio visual artists are constantly adjusting and reacting, in feedback to their own exhaustive preparation.
Variations V is exceptionally demanding, in ways particular to Cage. As a composer, he was willing to be humble, while managing to maintain a clear vision of an outcome for the work as a whole. Cage understood that it was not possible for one person to direct or “produce” the work; as such our Variations rests on a community of artists whose practices are influenced by the work of John Cage.
We are presenting Variations V out of respect for the strong and vibrant community of experimental new media artists here in Chicago, and as a contribution to and reflection of that community.
