The Cyborg Hand: Gesture, Technology, Disability and Interdisciplinarity in Whatever Weighs You Down

Abstract

This article examines the collaborative genesis of a new work for solo performer co-composed by Neil Luck and the author, Whatever Weighs You Down (2022), with a focus on the use of MiMU sensor gloves, and the development of a work-specific gestural approach to this technology. This gestural approach was strongly influenced by a collaborator on the project, Deaf performance artist Chisato Minamimura. Minamimura’s expertise in BSL, dance, ‘sign mime’, and other approaches to movement allowed the creative team to collaboratively develop an approach to the gloves that explored the communicative dimensions of gesture, rather than simply maximising their functions as instruments. This collaboration demonstrates how new and innovative approaches to digital instruments can emerge through collaborations that include disabled artists.