Örjan Sandred

Multimedia installation

Tracing the Space Between

I have had the idea of a multimedia installation focused on the visual expression in a music performance for quite some time. During 2024-2025 I found the opportunity to create it.

Tracing the Space Between explores how gesture—through dance and conducting—maps sound into space. Sonic expressions are embodied and communicated across boundaries within a shared sensory field. Featuring three conductors and one dancer, the work places strong emphasis on visual communication.

All four performers embody the same musical pulse and expression, which in the final installation is removed and replaced by a soundscape that closely follows the visual expressions. This new soundtrack is intentionally minimal, occasionally reduced to the ticking of a clock that mark the passing of time and pulse, allowing the visual language to come to the forefront.  At other moments the sounds swell in response to the performers’ physical energy, finding sonic accents and movements that reflect and amplify the gestural expression.

Tracing the Space Between was created in collaboration with Stephan Azulay, principal dancer at the Winnipeg Royal Ballet, Hans Ek, freelance conductor and arranger in Sweden, Jacquie Dawson, Associate Professor and the Director of Bands at the University of Manitoba and Julian Pellicano, staff conductor of the National Ballet of Canada in Toronto.