VESTIGIA (2009)
The Perimeter Institute
String Quartet, Dancers, Video, and Computers
Commissioned by Penderecki String Quartet / Canada Council for the Arts Grant

Quantum physics continuously raises fascinating questions about what reality really is. Inspired by the many phenomena of 
quantum physics, the work metaphorically explores these questions for reality, mainly of time and of the uncertainty 
principle (the more precisely one property is known, the less precisely the other property can be known). In this work, 
uncertainty between reality and illusion is constantly at play.  References to different points of time (traces of the past and 
hint of what is to come) are manifested at various sections of the work, and are often presented by the live-electronic 
sounds and video images.  The level of uncertainty becomes increasingly stronger at several moments in this work, 
especially as the sound of the string quartet or the movement of the dancer become more focused and pronounced.  The 
work is held quietly together by an electronic sound derived from a pulse used to calculate the data of the NMR machine at 
the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo. The wave data of this pulse was transformed digitally into sound, 
and is heard continuously in the background throughout the work. 

This project was commissioned by the Penderecki String Quartet.  The work was premiered by the Penderecki String 
Quartet and members of the Dancetheatre David Earl: Davide Earle (choreography);  Michael English (dance);  and Danielle  
Baskerville (dance). The work was realized in collaboration with Osama Moussa and Raymond Laflamm, one of the leading 
quantum computing physicist,the Founding Memeber of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics and Director of the 
Institute for Quantum Computing at the University of Waterloo.






      

Yoei (1999)  
tape, six percussionists, and a dancer (attached to four sensors

Eclipse (1996)
tape, robotic lights, and two dancers / engineer: Issac Roth