Dr Michele Danjoux

Biography

Dr. Michèle Danjoux is a practicing artist and internationally esteemed researcher with a background in Fashion Design. She is also an accomplished Design educator with over twenty years of experience in Higher Education. Her academic posts have included Senior Lecturer at Nottingham Trent University (1993-2009), where she also mentored early career researchers, and Principal Lecturer and Masters Programme Leader at De Montfort University (2009-2013). She is currently Research Coordinator for the School of Media & Communication at London College of Fashion; the LCF Research Hubs and UAL Performing Dress Lab, an International Research Laboratory established with partners at Aalto University, Finland and Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Australia (http://performingdresslab.com). Danjoux’s research interests intersect Design and Performance, and centre on the interactive potentials of wearables in real-time immersive contexts. Her contributions to knowledge in her transdisciplinary field, linking fashion/costume design with performance, dance, sound arts, digital/networked media, and interaction design, for affective wearing of audio and visual output, have been both distinctive and pioneering – generating a more critical approach to the role of costume in performance. Her research outputs were returnable in the RAE 2008 and REF 2014.

In 2004, Danjoux co-founded the design and performance laboratory (DAP-Lab [http://people.brunel.ac.uk/dap/]), with choreographer and media artist Johannes Birringer, as creative research catalyst to explore her interests in the convergences between Fashion and the Performing Arts, and her innovative concepts for materialising design in motion. The Lab quickly gained international recognition, was awarded grants (The British Council, Daiwa Foundation [2009-10], and European Research Council Consolidator Grant [METABODY, 2013-17]), and today, receives invitations to numerous international co-operations. In 2005, Danjoux was the first fashion designer in the UK to work in telematic dance and networked performance (virtual and interactive costumes), when DAP-Lab collaborated with designer, Galina Mihaleva in Arizona on The Telematic Dress and Emergent Dress projects (2004-06) with Arizona State University. This innovation was discussed by Professor Andy Lavender in a chapter he wrote on Theatre and Technology in 2008 (DOI: 10.1002/9780470751480.ch47). Furthermore, Danjoux’s research has influenced other artists and designers across a variety of practices, evidenced in publications that refer back to her ground-breaking work. The German Tanz Magazine published a feature on Danjoux’s designs in 2013 (‘Touch me, wear me’, Tanz: Zeitschrift für Ballett, Tanz und Performance, May 2013, pp. 70—71) at a point when the concept of sensortized performance wearables was hardly known on the European continent.

Danjoux is widely published, and has presented her research and shown design films at a number of international conferences: Digital Cultures (Nottingham [2005]), Wearable Futures (Newport [2005]), IFFTI (Tokyo, Japan [2005] & Toronto, Canada [2007]), and DRHA (Dartington [2007] & Brunel University [2010]), Critical Costumes (Edge Hill University [2013]), Shapeshifting (Auckland, New Zealand [2014]), Bodily Scenography (Loughborough University [2018]). Her first collection of intelligent garments premiered in Suna no Onna (Woman of the Dunes) at the Laban Centre, London in 2007. Subsequent audiophonic costume designs featured in: UKIYO (Moveable Worlds), a choreographic installation, at Kibla Multimedijski Centre, Slovenia and Sadler’s Wells, London in 2010; and the performance for the time being at Watermans, London in May 2012 and the Lilian Baylis Studio, Sadler’s Wells in April 2014. Additionally, her research outputs include joint and sole authored articles published in peer-reviewed journals, and book chapters. Her most recent contributions are: Danjoux, M. (forthcoming) ‘Choreosonic Wearables: creative collaborative practices’, in Prickett, Stacey and Thomas, Helen (eds.) Routledge Companion to Dance Studies, London: Routledge; Danjoux, M. (2019) ‘Design-in-Motion: Sculpting Choreosonic Wearables’, Theatre and Performance Design, special issue: Bauhaus 100, 5:2, pp. 114-124. Birringer, J. and Danjoux, M. (2019) ‘Sound and Wearables’, in Filimowicz, Michael (ed.) Foundations in Sound Design. London: Routledge, pp. 243-274.

In 2018, Danjoux was awarded a PhD by London College of Fashion for her practice-based thesis entitled ‘Design-in-Motion: Choreosonic Wearables in Performance. Her project examined the impacts of dress – envisioned as wearable performance design – on practices of movement choreography and sound composition in interactive performance frameworks through the use of specially designed audiophonic wearables. It specifically interrogated the predominantly peripheral position of dress to the emergence of movement in contemporary dance – arguing for a greater interlinking of costume and choreography.



Public output from research and scholarly activity

Books and Academic Journals

Danjoux, M. (forthcoming) ‘Choreosonic Wearables: creative collaborative practices’, in Prickett, Stacey and Thomas, Helen (eds.) Routledge Companion to Dance Studies, London: Routledge.
Danjoux, M. (2019) ‘Design-in-Motion: Sculpting Choreosonic Wearables’, Theatre and Performance Design, special issue: Bauhaus 100, 5:2, pp. 114-124.
Birringer, J. and Danjoux, M. (2019) ‘Sound and Wearables’, in Filimowicz, Michael (ed.) Foundations in Sound Design. London: Routledge, pp. 243-274.
Danjoux, M. (2014) ‘Choreography and Sounding Wearables’, special issue of Scene on ‘Critical Costume’, Scene, 2:1&2, pp.197-220.
Danjoux, M. (2014) ‘Interactive Technologies, Costume Design and Choreography’, in Klaus Behringer, Johannes Birringer (eds), Manifest der Interaktionskunst. Saarbrücken: PoCul Verlag, pp. 37-48.
Birringer, J. and Danjoux, M. (2013) ‘The sound of Movement Wearables: Performing UKIYO’, Leonardo, 46:3, pp. 233-40.
Birringer, J. and Danjoux, M. (2009) ‘Wearable Performance’, Digital Creativity, Routledge, 20: 1-2, pp. 95-113.
Birringer, J. and Danjoux, M. (2009) ‘Wearables in Performance’, in McCann, Jane and Bryson, David (eds.) Smart Clothes and Wearable Technology. Woodhead; Cambridge, pp.388-419.
Birringer, J. and Danjoux, M. (2007) ‘The Emergent Dress: Transformation and Intimacy in Streaming Media and Fashion Performance’, Performance Research, special issue on DRHA2006: Digital Resources for the Arts and Humanities 2006, September 3–6, Dartington College of Arts, UK, with interactive DVD, pp. 41-52.


Conference Proceedings/Public Lectures

Lecture: ‘Wearable Performance: Fashioning the Choreographic’, 28 May 2019, Design for Performance Hub, London College of Fashion, University of the Arts London, UK.
Paper Presentation: ‘Choreosonic Wearables in Performance: the sensory-kinetic dimensions of fashioning the choreographic’, Symposium: Bodily Scenography: The body in 20th-century stage design, 26 January 2018, Loughborough University, UK.
‘Design-in-Motion: Choreosonic Wearables in Performance’, presentation of PhD research, 29 April 2017, E-Stitches event, the V&A, London.
Paper Presentation: ‘Wearables and Choreosonic Performance’, Symposium: Fashion Responsive, 24 March 2015. Geneva University of Art & Design (HEAD), Geneva, Switzerland.
Paper Presentation: ‘Audible Choreography and the Limits of Control’ with Johannes Birringer, INTERNATIONAL METABODY FORUM IMF Conference, History and Ontologies of Movement-Gesture, 11 July 2014, Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM/Madrid), Spain. (http://metabody.eu/forum/imf-2014/)
Paper Presentation: ‘Re-Fashioning the Performing Body: The transformational potentials of fashion in contemporary dance performance’, Shapeshifting Conference: Transformative Paradigms of Fashion & Textile Design, 14-16 April 2014, AUT University, Auckland, New Zealand.
Paper Presentation: ‘Wearables in Performance: The Choreographic Potentials of Bodies and Design in Motion’, The Body in Twentieth and Twenty-First Century Performance, 5 June 2013, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK.
Paper Presentation/panel member: ‘Design in Motion’, Embodied Cognition: Practice-based Research in Doctoral Programmes, The HEA Discipline Workshop and Seminar Series 2012–2013, 30 April 2013, University of Winchester, UK.
Paper Presentation: ‘The Sound of Movement Wearables’, Critical Costume: Towards a Vocabulary of Scenographic Bodies. A Symposium and Exhibition, 17-18 January 2013, Edge Hill University, UK.
Lecture: ‘The Sound of Movement Wearables,’ Dance Research Seminar, 13 November 2012, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK.
Paper Presentation: ‘An Intimate and Dynamic Design Process’, Artaud Forum 1: The World from Within & Without, in Memorium of Kazuo Ohno, 4-5 April 2011, Artaud Performance Centre, Brunel University, London, UK.
Paper Presentation: ‘Sensual Wearables/The Sound of Character’, DRHA2010: Digital Resources for the Humanities and the Arts 2010, Sensual Technologies: Collaborative Practices of Interdisciplinarity, 5-8 September, Brunel University, London, UK.
Paper Presentation: ‘The Emergent Dress: fashion and dance - ScreenDress’, DRHA2007: Digital Resources for the Humanities and the Arts 2007, Doing Digital: Using Digital Resources in the Arts and Humanities, 9-12 September 2007, Dartington College of Arts, UK.
Paper Presentation: ‘The Emergent Dress: fashion, performance and materiality’, Extreme Fashion. Pushing the boundaries of design, technology and business; pp. 214-233; 9th Annual International Foundation of Fashion Technology Institutes (IFFTI) Conference, April 12–15, 2007, Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada.
Paper Presentation: ‘The Telematic Dress: Evolving garments and distributed design in streaming media and fashion performance’, Globalization of the Fashion Industry. ‘Future Vision and the Challenges for Education and Business’; pp. 156-162; 7th Annual International Foundation of Fashion Technology Institutes (IFFTI) Conference, October 31–November 5, 2005, Bunka Women’s University, Tokyo, Japan.
Paper Presentation: ‘The Telematic Dress - Evolving garments’, Wearable Futures Hybrid Culture in the Design and Development of Soft Technology; Conference Proceedings DVD; 14-16 September 2005, University of Wales, Newport, Wales, UK.


Performances/Exhibitions

Kimosphere no.5: DAP-Lab; immersive mixed reality installation performance, Staging Atmosphere’s Conference, 9 December 2017, Queen Mary University, London.
‘NailFeathers Dress’, dance film with Elisabeth Sutherland, design by Michèle Danjoux, 2016: https://youtu.be/Iw4T-uM3n-U
Metakimosphere no.3: DAP-Lab; immersive kinetic performance installation, Performance Architectures, Wearables and Gestures of Participation, International METABODY FORUM 2016, 4-9 April 2016, Artaud Performance Centre, Brunel University, London, (http://metabody.eu/imf-2016-london/). Film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DdAcv37jmc
Metakimosphere: DAP-Lab; performance film/presentation of choreosonic wearables, Metaformance – Politics of Perception, International Metabody Forum 2015 Paris, 6-9 October 2015, Le Cube, Issy Les Moulineaux, Paris, France (http://metabody.eu/imf-2015/).
for the time being [Victory over the Sun], DAP Lab, choreosonic performance with sounding wearables, 3 & 4 April 2014, Lilian Baylis Studio, Sadler’s Wells, London.
‘TatlinTower and RedMicroDress’, BBC World Series ‘Click’ Program on Wearable Technologies, 25 February 2014 BBC Radio Theatre, London.
‘Critical Costumes’, Film, ARTBAR, MCA (Museum of Contemporary Art Australia), February 2014, The Rocks, Sidney, Australia, curated by Chicks on Speed.
‘Design-in-Motion’, Performance/film demonstration of costumes, Night of the Experiments, CYNETart, 15 November 2013 Festival, Dresden/Hellerau, Germany.
‘RedMicroDress in the 10th Country’, interactive dance, August 2013, Interaktionslabor, Göttelborn, Germany.
for the time being: Audiophonic Design-in-Motion, presentation and demonstration of artworks transforming sensorial design into a fuller exploration of narrative, fashion and choreography with Johannes Birringer and Helenna Ren (DAP-Lab), Kinetica, 2013, London.
‘The Sound of Movement Wearables’ - an exhibition of audiophonic design prototypes, Critical Costume: Towards a Vocabulary of Scenographic Bodies. A Symposium and Exhibition, 17-18 January 2013, Edge Hill University.
for the time being, DAP Lab, choreosonic performance with sounding wearables, 14 March 2008, Watermans International Digital Arts Festival, 2012, London.
‘Bourdon’, an interactive dance, Interaktionslabor Göttelborn, August 2011, Germany.
UKIYO (Moveable Worlds): DAP Lab; choreographic installation with sonic interfaces, Lilian Baylis Studio, Sadler’s Wells, 26 November 2010, London.
UKIYO (Moveable Worlds), DAP Lab; choreographic installation with sonic interfaces, Kibla Multimedijski Centre, 18 June 2010, Maribor, Slovenia.
Design-in-Motion – an exhibition of film and costumes for Suna no Onna (2007-08), Bonington Gallery, July 2008, Nottingham, UK.
Suna no Onna, a movement-design performance and dance installation; Watermans Art Centre, 2008, London.
Suna no Onna, a movement-design performance and dance installation; INTIMACY: Across Visceral and Digital Performance, Laban Studio Theatre, 8 December 2007, London: https://intimateperformance.wordpress.com.
‘Klüver’, Design in Motion festival, Prague Quadrennial, 2007, Prague, Czech Republic.
‘Klüver’, presented in the B-Sides Program at Upgrade! International, 2006, Oklahoma City, USA, curated in collaboration with New Media Scotland.
‘Intimate Klüver/The Emergent Dress’, diptych film installation, DRHA, 3-6 September 2006, Dartington College of Arts.
‘tedr’, a three-site telepresence performance – Nottingham, UK, Phoenix, Arizona, USA, Sydney, Australia, Digital Cultures Festival, November 2005, Nottingham, UK.
‘The Emergent Dress’, three-site telepresence performance – December 2005, Nottingham (UK), Rome (Italy) Phoenix (USA).
‘The Emergent Dress’, diptych film exhibition, Wearable Futures, September 2005, Newport, Wales.


Interviews/Radio features

METABODY interviews, edited by Jaime del Val, International METABODY Platform, Le Cube, Centre Création Numérique, Paris, France, 2015: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlbnzwMkSVk
METABODY project interviews, edited by Julia Roeselers, STEIM Amsterdam, 2014:
https://vimeo.com/117743950
‘Wearable designs for audiophonic dance’, featured on BBC World Service, in a special edition of the program “Click” from the BBC’s Radio Theatre, live on 25 February 2014.
‘Design in Motion: Interview with Michèle Danjoux’, recorded by Sönke Zehle, Performance Academy/Interaktionslabor Göttelborn/XM Lab, Germany: https://vimeo.com/30504856

‘Fragments: Interview with Michèle Danjoux’, recorded by Sönke Zehle, Performance Academy/Interaktionslabor Göttelborn/XM Lab, Germany: https://vimeo.com/30503191

‘Limits: Interview with Michèle Danjoux’, recorded by Sönke Zehle, Performance Academy/Interaktionslabor Göttelborn/XM Lab, Germany: https://vimeo.com/30502204

‘Hacking Culture: Interview with Michèle Danjoux’, recorded by Sönke Zehle, Performance Academy/Interaktionslabor Göttelborn/XM Lab, Germany: https://vimeo.com/30496839

‘Audiophinic Design: Interview with Michèle Danjoux’, recorded by Sönke Zehle, Performance Academy/Interaktionslabor Göttelborn/XM Lab, Germany: https://vimeo.com/30495735

‘Liberating the Body: Interview with Michèle Danjoux’, recorded by Sönke Zehle, Performance Academy/Interaktionslabor Göttelborn/XM Lab, Germany: https://vimeo.com/30494422

‘Design and Performance: Interview with Michèle Danjoux’, recorded by Sönke Zehle, Performance Academy/Interaktionslabor Göttelborn/XM Lab, Germany: https://vimeo.com/30493694


Creative Research Workshops/Residencies

‘Mourning for a dead moon’ – interdisciplinary laboratory, Artaud Performance Centre, Brunel University London, June 2019.
INTERNATIONAL METABODY FORUM IMF 2016, Performance Architectures, Wearables and Gestures of Participation, Brunel University, London, UK, 4-9 April - Workshop/outcomes/public presentations of new wearable design work (http://metabody.eu/imf-2016-london/).
INTERNATIONAL METABODY FORUM IMF 2015, Medialab-Prado, Madrid, Spain, 15-25 July – Workshop/outcomes/public presentations of new wearable design work (http://metabody.eu/imf-2015/).
INTERNATIONAL METABODY FORUM IMF 2014 STEIM, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 9-14 December - Workshop/outcomes/public presentations of new wearable design work. For a brief video documentation, go here: http://steim.org/2015/01/international-metabody-forum-imf/
‘Interactions between E-textiles, Dance and Sound’ STEIM, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 8-13 October 2014 - an interdisciplinary pressure cooker workshop to examine new scientific innovations in intelligent garment design for performance, with public presentation.
INTERNATIONAL METABODY FORUM IMF 2014, Medialab-Prado, Madrid, Spain, 10-18 July - Workshop/ outcomes/public presentations of new wearable design work (http://metabody.eu/forum/imf-2014/).
HOLOstage Dress Rehearsal, collaboration on EU funded METABODY project with TMA Hellerau – CYNETART, Festival at Festspielhaus Hellerau, Dresden, Germany, 14-16 November 2014.
CYNETART festival platform for public presentation of METABODY project, Festspielhaus Hellerau, Dresden, Germany, 14-17 2014 November.
‘Motionbank: Live & Online’ – The Forsythe Company, Frankfurt, Germany, November 2013.
Interaktionslabor 10th annual media lab/performance academy, Göttelborn, Germany, August 2013.
ARTAUD FORUM 1: The World from Within and Without, dance-theatre workshop, Artaud Performance Centre, Brunel University, 2011.
Interaktionslabor 9th annual media lab/performance academy, Göttelborn, Germany, August 2011.
UKIYO 2 [Moveable World] – international workshop, Antonin Artaud Centre, Brunel University London, 2010.
‘Networked Virtual Performance Environments – UKIYO (Moveable Worlds)’, Keio University, Japan, 3-13 December 2009 - a mixed reality choreographic research collaboration between DAP-Lab and Keio University: http://people.brunel.ac.uk/dap/TOKYOLAB.htm.
UKIYO – cross-cultural workshop on virtual environments with artists from INETdance Japan and members of DAP-Lab, London, Artaud Performance Centre, Brunel University, 2009.
‘Design and Emotion’ – 5th international Design and Emotion Conference, Gothenburg, Sweden; 2008.
Interaktionslabor 7th annual media lab/performance academy, Göttelborn, Germany, August 2009.
‘Bodies of Colour’ with Johannes Birringer, INTIMACY: Across Visceral and Digital Performance, Goldsmiths University of London; December 2007.
‘Inscribing Dance in a New Space: widening the perception’, Digital Dance workshop, 2006 Monaco Dance festival, Monte Carlo.
‘Capture, Wearable Design and Interface Lab’ with Johannes Birringer, at Interaktionslabor, Göttelborn, Germany (http://interaktionslabor.de); July 2007.
‘The Empire’s New Clothes – Art/Fashion/Technology’ workshop facilitated by Sabine Seymour, Atelier Nord, Oslo, Norway, May 2006.
Digital Cultures Lab, international dance and technology laboratory, Nottingham, 2005.
‘Dance and Wearable Computing’: Cultures, Fashions and Design Workshop, with Yvonne Watson (Nottingham), Thecla Schiphorst (Vancouver), Erin Manning (SenseLab, Montréal). Digital Cultures Lab in Dance Technologies. The Nottingham Trent University, December 2005.