Artist of Light show is like nothing Hong Kong's ever seen
Miral Kotb had a wow moment when she merged her passions for software engineering and dance. The result is iLuminate, dance troupe who perform hip hop in the dark wearing costumes covered in wireless-controlled LEDs
"Lights, camera … lights,"would be a good way to introduce dance company iLuminate's show Artist of Light. That's because this group, which leapt to fame in the US after coming third on the America's Got Talent television show in 2011, perform in the dark wearing costumes covered with wireless-controlled LEDs.
Lighting engineers, software programmers and choreographers work together to integrate the lighting and special effects to illuminate the characters. Inside their costumes, the dancers perform a mix of hip hop, breakdance, modern dance and even ballet moves. Powered by a software built by Miral Kotb, the dancer and software developer who founded the troupe, Artist of Light looks like a techno Blue Man Group or a futuristic, urban Cirque du Soleil. iLuminate performed for two years off-Broadway in New York, and it has now been transported in its entirety to Hong Kong.
"It's the first software of its kind," says Trevor Harrison, a choreographer and dancer with the show since 2012. "It's a portable wireless-controlled light programme which controls suits made of electroluminescent lights and LEDs."
The suit weighs quite a lot, and you have to wear it for an hour, which makes dancing a challenge. It heats up like your computer does when you leave it on.
The dancers must rehearse vigorously to keep in time with Kotb's programme, explains Harrison, who goes by the nickname "Cleva Trev".
"It takes hours and hours of working with Miral, who designs the lighting, and the choreographers. The suit weighs quite a lot, and you have to wear it for an hour, which makes dancing a challenge. It heats up like your computer does when you leave it on. If you're new to it, it's quite difficult to dance in, but after a while you get used to it."
iLuminate is the brainchild of Kotb, the company's founder, chief executive, and inspiration. She developed an interest in computer programming at the age of nine, and later graduated in the subject. Although her overriding ambition was always to become a dancer, she took a job as a software engineer with news agency Bloomberg in New York. A brief battle with cancer led to a decision to dance full-time. She hit on the idea of combining performance with technology in 2009 after attending an Apple designers conference in which panelists talked about placing wireless devices in children's toys.
"Miral's original passions were software engineering and dance, and she found a way to merge those two things together," says Harrison. "She had a 'wow' moment — an epiphany — about what would happen if you put lights on the human body, particularly a dancer's body. The idea grew from there and next thing you know we're on America's Got Talent, and now we're performing across the world."