Interrupt: Interactive Hypermedia (2000)

Interrupt, a retro-engineered multimedia performance installation premiered in fall 2000. Interrupt was a unique live experience that pushed the boundaries of performance with engineered spaces where audiences, performers and technology could interact.

Resisting the temptation to put the latest shiny new technology on display, Interrupt explored the underside of progress - meltdown, misfire and miscommunication. Within the performance space, audiences participated in the operation of a mechanized, yet functioning dystopia where ‘high’ technology served the most crude ends. With Interrupt, Liminal uncovered the ambiguity between the archaic and the futuristic, the living and the programmed, and the alchemy of base materials transformed into substances of a different order. Moreover, Interrupt was about letting someone experience something they didn’t quite expect and then seeing how long they would play with it before they get bored again.

Interrupt was directed and programmed by John Berendzen and created by over a dozen Liminal company members and invited artists who collaborated in the design, engineering, rehearsal and production. Performers included Rich Southwick, Amanda Boekelheide, Jennifer Olson and Linda Miles.

Multimedia gallery

Video clip [.mov, 1 Mb]

Concept paper [pdf]

List of components

Text used in the show [pdf]

Review in the Willamette Week