hamletmachine was an interactive sound piece by Jeff Burke, based on Heiner Muller’s play Hamletmachine, a deconstruction of Shakespeare and German history. The installation shattered a recording of Muller’s dialogue into sixteen pieces.
During the initial incarnation at Fusion 2000, visitors entering a harshly lit, seemingly silent room triggered playback as their shadows fell on small sensors, raising or lowering each dialogue fragment’s volume based on a shadow’s depth. The audio fragments played back simultaneously and continuously, but at different levels, sometimes inaudibly. Through learning and experimenting with the manipulation of their own shadows, the visitors became performers, and could reveal the whole play at once, a fragment at a time, or any variation in between.
The dialogue was recorded by Adam Shive and Meg Ferrell, and was programmed in Max/MSP.
The version in Boston was updated with projected text fragments that created shadows when no one was in the room, allowing the space (and play) to talk to itself.
Museums & the Web, Boston—2002.
Fusion 2000, Los Angeles—2000.