NIP (New Interfaces for Performance) is a practical, artists led, workshop and touring event, which examines techniques for creating mixed media and interactive work for live, interactive contexts - for the most this refers to live performance (music, theatre, dance, sound) and interactive, real-time installation.

How did N.I.P. begin?
The project was set up by Teresa Dillon, an artist/researcher/director, who has been working in the field of mixed media for some years. Teresa runs and facilitates the project, taking an informal, open approach and participates in the workshops, presentations and events. One of the key reasons in establishing the project was to create a network or community of interdisciplinary artists, interested in sharing practice and co-developing ideas as well as presenting their work in new locations. Key to the project was making institutional links to organisations and individuals already working in the field.

The first year of the project (2007), involved working with various partner institutions to select nine artists drawn from across the UK, The Netherlands and Portugal. One of the initial partners in the project, has been STEIM (NL), who alongside the Watershed (UK) and Restart (PT), have supported and hosted the project in 2007. Other institutions who supported the project in 2007, included Lisboa20 and Bomba Suicida (PT). Over 2008, we continue to work with these institutions and organisations, alongside new partners such as ‘O Espaço do Tempo’ (PT), developing the project and bringing it into the next phase.

Over 2007, the ‘N.I.P.’ crew, have developed together and grown to include other artists and practitioners who we have picked up along our journey. Together we now consider this project to be a ‘research collective’, a group a practitioners who are developing projects, which use various tools or technologies to create interactive experiences.

The N.I.P. approach
For N.I.P., the idea behind the work, comes first but this is closely tied with the tools and materials that we shape and to make the work. We generally consider ‘new interfaces’ to be the creation of artistic work (music, visuals, sound, graphics, theatre), which uses or repurposes existing or emerging digital devices, tools and infrastructures. Each one of us, within the project, make and play, in different ways and the form our work takes, explores different types of relations - eg audience-performers, performer-performer and/or performer-instrument relations. Consequently as an interdisciplinary group our work also takes different forms cutting across the fields of visual art, sound art, performance, theatre, installation, fine art and software art.

Current focus
The theme for the 2007-2009 N.I.P. series is on gesture and movement within live performance. This refers to interfaces, which use movement - human gestures, touch, environmental forces etc - as the means through which to interact and experience the work.

So far….
Over 2007 three core NIP events will took place in Bristol, UK, Amsterdam, The Netherlands and Lisbon, Portugal. At each location a lead artist has been selected to facilitate a three-day workshop, which will be attend by artists invited from the UK, The Netherlands and Portugal. As part of the tour, at each location, lead and participating artists will give public performances and talks.

In December 2007, we also returned to STEIM, for a one-week residency, where we discussed the 2007 programme and our plans for 2008/09.