In her work Pervasive Games: Representations of Existential In-Between-Ness, Jane Tapper explores a great many things, most notably that of an “in-between-ness [that] generates an existential dialogue into which players and non-players are propelled.” (Tapper, 2014, p. 143) The idea of performance is called into question here – is an audience really an audience if they aren’t aware, and is a performance therefore really a performance, and not a performative act, if there is no audience? Is a performance ruined if the “players” have to explain what they are doing to “non-players”? Or is there, as Tapper suggests, a “dialogue” created between “players” and “non-players” that begins with “the sudden recognition of the odd behavior of the players in quotidian space [that] generates feelings of uncertainty, danger, even fear amongst the non-players” (Tapper, 2014, p. 147) to create an even bigger sense of relief once the “non-players” realise what they have just witnessed is a performance and therefore not reality?

In our workshop this week we investigated further the potential relationship between performers and audience with Makey Makey machines. This can be something as simple as a banana hooked up via crocodile clips to a computer, and using small electric charges and complete circuits, becomes a drum set. The potential uses for this technology in a pervasive sense are endless, and would offer a unique performer/audience dynamic in our final performance.

Tapper, J. (2014) Pervasive Games: Representations of Existential In-Between-Ness.Themes in Theatre, 8, 143-161