Our story
As an artist, I am deeply passionate about creating installation art that involves the following elements: is interactive, has an integral dance aspect, and eliminates the hierarchy of performer, audience, and contributing artists. I am primarily a dance artist and am aware that installations are usually visual or technological art. I am challenging this notion and bringing concert and stage dance into this world. My work shifts how roles in art are perceived and demonstrates the importance of all people involved. In dance, the stage is unreachable, and audiences sit back and consume. Our culture is changing, the consumer is now also the creator (mostly online). In the past, my work has done just this, people are in awe of how close they are to the dancers and begin to understand how in real time they can shift and become a part of the art. I am so excited to share House of Umbra as a social experimentation, a collaboration, and a living installation.
About the Project
House of Umbra is an interactive installation, a display of contemporary gogo dance and projection mapping, as well as a space in which audiences can play, dance and celebrate movement.
This project is a large-scale installation that brings art and performance from the ethereal to the real. This piece is designed to bring stage performance to the ground level. It is intimate, interactive, and an attraction to those who love to dance and move.
House of Umbra is a 10ft x 20ft x 10ft structure with shadow screens on three of its sides. The light shines on the white screens that line the structure to create a shadow screen effect for the outside viewer. At dusk, dancers perform a two-hour durational performance inside the box. They play with stillness, depth, and symmetry to create illusions within their performance. This performance is paired with projection. Abstract colours and designs are projected to juxtapose the negative space created by shadows and change in response to the movement in the installation.
Our movement is inspired by contemporary dance, involving the distortion and abstraction of the body, using shadows to facilitate. It also involves burlesque and gogo-inspired dance bringing the atmosphere of festival stage performers to the audience. Audiences are welcome to venture in and out of the structure and create their own shadow art when it isn’t occupied by dancers. House of Umbra encourages play and creation, a chance for audiences to create art and be inspired by the music and movement around them.
The House of Umbra is a beautiful place to bring people together to create their own art as well as view it. Audiences can come together and play behind the screens, creating silhouettes by being backlit as they enter the installation. This project brings the nostalgia of playing in front of the school projector light as we did as kids. House of Umbra encourages people to play and interact by creating shapes and images to display for their friends and passersby.
About the Artists
Charlotte Telfer-Wan
Charlotte Telfer-Wan is a Canadian artist whose work focuses on interactive and multidisciplinary performance art. She aims to shift the framework of how an audience experiences dance by creating without boundaries between the stage and spectators.
Layla Le Love
Layla is integral to this project as a supporting choreographer and dancer. She is a professional, award-winning, gogo and burlesque dancer. Dubbed the alternative queen of the underground scene, Layla’s energy fills every room she enters. She brings a harmonious balance of professionalism and playfulness to all her collaborations.
Charlotte Telfer-Wan 