Centered around several short films from streaming performances created in 2005, this paper
explores new ideas for movement technologies and garment design in an arts and digital research
context. The "telematic dress" project, developed at the DAP Lab in Nottingham, involves
transdisciplinary intersections between fashion and live performance, interactive system architecture,
electronic textiles, wearable technologies, choreography, and anthropology.
The concept on an evolving garment design that is materialized (moved) in live performance
originates from DAP Lab's experimentation with telematics and distributed media (http://art.ntu.ac.
uk/performance_research/birringer/dap.htm] addressing "connective tissues" through a study of
perception/proprioception in the wearer (tactile sensory processing) and the dancer/designer/viewer
relationship. This study is conducted as cross-cultural communication with online performance
partners in Europe, the US, Brazil and Japan. The inter-active space is predicated on transcultural
questions: how does the movement with an evolving design and wearable interactive sensors travel,
how does movement - and capturing of movement - allow the design to emerge toward a garment
statement, and how are bodies-in-relation-to sensory fabrics affected by the multidimensional
kinesthetics of a media-rich, responsive environment
