The Game of Life

Jie Gao, Kelly Choi, Kwame Kyei-Boateng, Kyra Todd, Teagan Ariss, Youssef Bassit

This work is an experimental collaborative performance piece devised by Undergraduate students in the Digital Media program and the Dance program for DATT 3931/ 4931 – Collaborative Performance Project I and II. It is presented through Zoom, and involves audience participation by way of the Zoom chat window. It incorporates movement, live original music, and video manipulation/ computer vision through Processing, the visual arts coding software/ language. The performance follows five participants in a bizarre game show called ‘The Game of Life’ as they go about their day in covid-19 lockdown. They are aware that they are being watched by an audience, but are otherwise disconnected from and unable to directly communicate with the audience and each other. Through votes cast by the audience, the host of the show gives the participants permission to let loose in any way they desire.

Creator bios:

My name is Jie (Jack) Gao. I am 32 years old from China. I am a foodie and world traveler having visited 30 countries. After graduating from high school in 2006, I worked in many jobs including sales, hotel reception and baker. One thing that I have learned from these diverse jobs is that a person’s attitude towards work and study is one of the most important factors to succeed in life. Studying at York University is something I never thought about. When I came to Canada in 2015, facing a foreign environment, I was excited and intimidated at the same time. After a few years of ESL (English as a Second Language) study, I improved my English, and can study at York University, soon to be graduating next year with a BA in Digital Media. I am grateful to my fellow classmates, TAs and professors, who made my college life intellectually challenging, culturally enriching, and fun. For this performance, for the Collaborative Performance Project class, we had many rehearsals and discussions. I enjoyed cooperating and coordinating with my classmates to make our performance dynamic and fun. This class has helped me maintain a positive and optimistic attitude towards life in this challenging time.

Kelly Choi is an emerging dance artist and teacher from Scarborough, Ontario. She specializes in contemporary/modern and ballet. Kelly has over fifteen years of dance experience in ballet and has been teaching and choreographing since the age of sixteen. Kelly has performed several classical ballet pieces on pointe including Études, Paquita, The Waltz of the Snowflakes and The Waltz of the Flowers from The Nutcracker. While attending the Claude Watson Secondary Arts Program, Kelly was given the opportunity to work with various choreographers/dancers such as Jacques Monfiston, William Yong, Eddie Kastrau, Lisa Auguste, Patrick Parson, and Natasha Poon Woo. Throughout high school, Kelly has choreographed her own group dance pieces and solos for various assemblies and shows. She is now in her first season in the York Dance Ensemble. Kelly plans to pursue teaching and performing as she completes her BFA in dance and BEd in concurrent education.

Kwame Kyei-Boateng is a digital media artist completing his final year in York University’s Digital Media Undergraduate program. With a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre and a background in devised theatre and collective creation, he is fascinated by interactivity and the interdisciplinary, and is particularly interested in bridging the gap between the physical and the digital. Through his work, he aims to explore human-computer interaction and communication through non-traditional interfaces and means of interaction. He seeks to create computational art that produces meaningful narratives and deeper engagement with an audience or user in the hopes of facilitating greater introspection of oneself and one’s existence in life and the world.

Born and raised in Vancouver, B.C, Kyra Todd started dancing at the age of 11. She first started dancing at West Side Dance Academy in Kitsilano, where she got involved in jazz, ballet, contemporary, and hip-hop. Kyra then moved to North Shore Academy of Dancing, in North Vancouver to continue her training. There, she joined a hip-hop apprentice company called Kill The Lights, where she performed at the annual Winter Family Ball in 2017, at the Fairmont Hotel in the heart of downtown Vancouver. Kyra has done competitive contemporary pieces, and solos in the Peak Invitational competitions in Whistler, North Vancouver, and Surrey, and received a high-level award for lyrical/contemporary dance. She is currently continuing her training in the dance program at York University, where she performed in Dance Innovations and has begun to perform in pieces alongside the York Dance Ensemble. Being in the York Dance Ensemble has allowed her to work with different choreographers, and experience a pre-professional atmosphere. Kyra spends much of her free time reading and educating herself on sustainable ways of living. She hopes to work important messages like climate change into dance pieces in the future, to open people’s eyes in a different way

Teagan Ariss is an emerging dance artist based in Toronto. She began training in her hometown of Waterloo, Ontario, in styles including contemporary, modern, and ballet. At the age of 15, Teagan choreographed her first dance, igniting her passion for movement creation. She is currently in her fourth year of the Dance BFA Honours program, in the choreography/performance stream. At York, she has performed in Dance Innovations and York Dances. In 2019, Teagan performed in the Guelph Dance Festival’s Breaking Ground Mentorship program, which gave her the opportunity to learn from Montreal choreographer, Lina Cruz. For the 2019 production of Bloom, a student-run showcase, she choreographed a new piece with mentorship from Susan Lee. Teagan is the Artistic Director of the exciting online version of Bloom for 2021. Upon graduating, she will continue pursuing a career in dance performance and choreography as well as dance writing.

My name is Youssef Bassit. I’m a 20 year old Intermedia student at York University. I own a custom media startup which handles soundtracks, video editing, logo design, etc. It’s a decent step towards that lifelong dream of helping others by doing what I love and getting paid for it. I’ve Also recently released my book which is being used to raise funds for a new SickKids hospital building. Kick in my bedroom door and you’ll probably find me watching “New Girl” or working on my latest new project (whatever that’s gonna be). My experience in our performance together, more than anything, showed me just how much a group of people can overcome by simply putting their heads together. There was no shortage of close calls and devastating technical difficulties but we pulled through in the end. Great job everyone. It was a pleasure.

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