Hosts was an interactive cinema work using ultrasound sensing and infrared sound transmission in the large public spaces of Bath Abbey. The work was based on the unique assignment of video characters to specific audience members, the characters moving from one projection screen to another in response to spectator movement.
Vertical screens were placed at strategic opposite points of the space. A visitor triggered the presence of a variety of unfocused and evanescent video characters through the use of positional detection devices (Chirpers) and interpretative software. Individual characters appeared at random and smiled, beckoned or otherwise indicated that the visitor(s) should follow them and pass onwards from screen to screen, keeping pace with the visitor[s]. These "hosts" were of a wide range of ages, gender, and social type , but always appeared singly to the participant.
A 3D audio landscape of acapella tonal voices accompanied the visitor between the screens on wireless headphones and formed a tangible changing audio landscape. The artist worked with a group of singers, musicians and sound designers in Bristol/Bath on this aspect of the piece.
If a visitor stood for more than a few seconds in front of a particular screen, the figure turned in the direction of the viewer and returned the visitor[s] stare. The video sprite looked the visitor up and down, or turned away in distraction and then spoke a series of poetic aphorisms, also seen as animated text on the screen. On a separate screen evanescent figures were continually climbing up and down two ladders mirroring the motif carved on the Abbey frontage.
