Photo credit:
Georgia Tech is among the country’s leading public universities when it comes to encouraging faculty and students to explore how technology interacts with everyday life. It’s natural the school’s
Ferst Center for Performing Arts should be a crossroads for progressive ideas in music, dance, performance art, theater, and technology. A perfect example: dancer and computer engineer Miral Kotb’s Nov. 17 performance of
iLuminate, a high-tech and visually dazzling collision of dance, music, and wearable technology.That show was thanks to Madison Cario, the center’s director. Since August 2014, Cario has served as curator of the center’s programming. This year, she’s charged with the task of filling the schedule with arts from various intersecting disciplines that are relevant to what’s happening at Georgia Tech and in Atlanta. “This year we’re rolling out this idea of planting ‘s.e.a.d.s’ — science, engineering, art, and design,” Cario says. “It’s about honoring the generations now and the generations to come who are more and more involved in a multitude of things.”It’s a cultural shift that expands upon the center’s traditional penchant for soft jazz, contemporary dance, and folk music. Cario wants to drive the center into daring new directions while also integrating typical programming with more progressive productions and booking more shows that incorporate new aesthetics and philosophies related to changing technology.The biggest challenge for Cario is managing the dialogue surrounding so much change. Additionally, much of the material coming in is so new and so original that it lacks a pre-defined category. “Where does virtual reality fit in with people who go to see music, or theater, or dance?” Cario asks.Before coming to Georgia Tech, Cario worked for the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia’s Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts. There she tried to use art as a bridge to connect new technology with events happening across campus. Sparking philosophical and technological change was an important part of her work at Penn, as it is at Georgia Tech. But entertaining audiences and creating a place where people from the community come to feel enriched while also having fun is just as important. “Joy — celebration — is an important part of what we do,” Cario says. “That’s why I like having work that’s entertaining and also thought provoking. That’s an important bridge.”A glance at the center’s 2017 schedule reveals a long list of burgeoning and classic innovative acts. In February, Natasha Tsakos, who’s known for integrating technology with live performance, gives her audience a look inside her creative process while designing her forthcoming interactive performance,
Billion Billions. MacArthur Fellow and Grammy-nominated avant-garde jazz pianist
Vijay Iyer will lead a trio rounded out by drummer Marcus Gilmore and bass player Stephan Crump that same month.
EarFilms: To Sleep To Dream in March will blindfold audiences while an advanced 3-D sound system creates a cinematic narrative for mind’s eye. One week later, famed modern classical ensemble
Bang on a Can All-Stars make a rare Atlanta appearance as well.
“We’re putting on artists that folks know and who I find to be groundbreaking,” Cario says. “We want to honor how they helped launch a whole field in a way of thinking about and creating music. I look for artists that are either on that edge and don’t necessarily have a name but are creating the next fill-in-the-blank.”