Prof Sally-Jane Norman

Biography

After obtaining an MA at the University of Canterbury, Aotearoa/ New Zealand, I received a Doctorat de 3ème cycle (1980) and Doctorat d'état (1990) from the Institut d'études théâtrales, Université de Paris III. My work on art and technology has involved collaboration with organisations including the Performing Arts Laboratory of the Centre national de la recherche scientifique, Unesco, and the French Ministry of Culture, and constant navigation between theory and practical experimentation (for documentation of practice-led projects, see <www.sallyjanenorman.net>). In 1993 I directed the Louvre “New Images and Museology” conference, and have led research initiatives for organisations including the International Institute of Puppetry (Charleville-Mézières), Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie (Karlsruhe) where I was engaged on European Framework Information Society Technology projects, and the Studio for Electro-Instrumental Music (Amsterdam) where I was Artistic Co-Director from 1998-2000. As Director General of the Ecole européenne supérieure de l'image (Angoulême/ Poitiers), I piloted the school's administrative transformation and multi-million euro funding scheme, and launched a practice-based Digital Arts PhD programme. I then moved to Newcastle University to found and direct Culture Lab which physically opened in 2006 as a SRIF-funded interdisciplinary research facility, and was awarded £12M as a Digital Economy hub in 2009. In January 2010 I came to Sussex to found the Attenborough Centre for the Creative Arts, an interdisciplinary resource to develop and consolidate cross-campus research and teaching initiatives such as the "Music and Sonic Media" MA programme (School of Media, Film and Music), Digital Humanities research, and activities in partnership with regional, national and international cultural organisations.

International links include status as Honorary Professor with the National Academy of Chinese Theatre Arts in Beijing, Visiting Fellow in the University of Porto's M4M - Music for Media - network, and co-founder and regular jury member for the Vida Art and Artificial Life Competition launched in 1999 by Fundación Telefónica in Madrid.

In addition to regularly reviewing grant applications for UK Research Councils, I ensure expert/ reviewer roles for international bodies including the European Research Council, Agence Nationale de la Recherche (France), Swiss National Science Foundation, and Programm zur Entwicklung und Erschliessung der Künste in Austria. Research advisory missions have additionally involved the Swedish Strategic Research Foundation, Portuguese Foundation of Science & Technology, Fonds québécois de recherche sur la société et la culture, and Conseil de Recherche at the French Ministry of Culture.

Role

Professor of Performance Technologies

Director, Attenborough Centre for the Creative Arts

Community and Business

Trustee engagements include past roles with the AV Festival (Newcastle-Gateshead), and The Public (West Bromwich), and current work on Sonic Acts International Advisory Board (Amsterdam), Mute Advisory Board (http://www.metamute.org), and DanceDigital (Essex). I undertake lobbying and policy interventions at numerous national and international levels.

As a theatre and art historian I am interested in performing arts and technology, history of scenography and theatre architectures, and in the new kinds of theatricality and dramaturgy inherent to interactive and distributed technological systems. My work engages with collaborative practice across disciplines and sectors, relations between art and technology, and disruptive innovation processes. It is strongly informed by engagement with experimental practice; overviews of theatre and performance technologies workshops I have led or participated in can be viewed at <www.sallyjanenorman.net>

I frequently advise on research and cultural policy frameworks, and review publications and creative commissions for national and international academic and cultural bodies. Amongst RCUK funded projects, a recent co-investigator role on the "Motion in Place Platform" (AHRC DEDEFI programme) led by Sussex colleague Kirk Woolford extends my practice and theory-driven research on expressive gesture in digital environments. I am engaged in the CHASE (Consortium for the Humanities and the Arts - South East) initiative, contributing to "Going Digital" and doctoral student led AHRC-funded collaborative workshops.

I have supervised and examined DPhils on distributed creative systems, improvisational and collaborative art forms, installation and performance employing hybrid media, and concepts of embodiment that respond to technological development processes. I welcome research proposals and perspectives of collaboration from students and colleagues interested in these areas.

Music and Sonic Media Masters programme (School of Media, Film and Music)

Sound Environments (core module)

This course examines sonic media creations and sound architectures, which may be physical, digital or hybrid. Seminars provide interdisciplinary context and review a range of practices, while workshops offer a space to develop ideas through practical engagement and theory. The rapid development of interdisciplinary sound creation beyond the concert hall is studied, where urban spaces are venues for creative work alongside new artistic, curatorial and critical practices arising from networked sound technologies (streamed radio, distributed performance works, podcasts, etc). Consideration is also given to examples of integrated architecture, space and organised sound, where digital processing possibilities open up notions of "performative architectures". Students either write a term paper (5000 words), or create a practical project and critical commentary, in response to these areas of creative investigation.

Art History (School of History, Art History and Philosophy)

Contributions to :

Art History Elective - Modern Era (2nd year)

MA Art History and Museum Curating programme

Current PhD students

Michéal O'Connell, "The Feedback Loop and Art Practice. An inquiry into the significance of cybernetics as a practical tool and paradigm in aesthetic critique", co-supervised with Blay Whitby/ Chris Thornton, Informatics

Ian Grant, "Analogue to Digital Puppetry: Translations and Transformations", co-supervised with Kirk Woolford, School of Media, Film & Music/ Sussex Innovation Centre

Daniel Hignell, "The other for whom I sing: Composition, communication, and the charge of the common good", co-supervised with Ed Hughes, Music, School of Media, Film & Music

Aysenur Karabulut, "Now Go Explore: Building Digital Bridges between Performing Arts and Education to Improve Children’s Perceived Self-Concept and Confidence", co-supervised with Robin Banerjee, Children's Relationships, Emotions, and Social Skills (CRESS), School of Psychology

Jonathan Armstrong, "Towards an Immersive Psychological Theatre: Suggestion, Magic and the Cognitive Approach to Performance Creation", co-supervised with Rob Chrisley, Centre for Research in Cognitive Science (COGS), School of Engineering and Informatics

Joe Watson,"Why aspects of analogue and non-computer-based practices are valued at a moment of the ubiquity of the digital", co-supervised with Ed Hughes, Music, School of Media, Film & Music

Current External Examining

Goldsmiths: Masters in Interactive Arts

Lasalle College of the Arts, Singapore: Animation Art, Interactive Art, Video Art (BA Hons)

PhD Examining

I have examined PhDs in the United Kingdom, France, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, New Zealand.

Norman, Sally-Jane (2013) Contexts of/as resistance. Contemporary Music Review, 32 (2-3). pp. 275-288. ISSN 0749-4467

Hogg, Bennett and Norman, Sally-Jane (2013) Resistant materials in musical creativity. Contemporary Music Review, 32 (2-3). pp. 115-118. ISSN 0749-4467

Hogg, Bennett and Norman, Sally-Jane, eds. (2013) Special issue: Resistant materials in musical creativity. Contemporary Music Review, 32 (2-3). Taylor & Francis (Routledge) , London. ISBN 0749-4467

Norman, Sally Jane (2012) Theatre as an art of emergence and individuation. Architectural Theory Review, 17 (1). pp. 117-133. ISSN 1326-4826

Norman, Sally-Jane (2012) Transductive contagions: theater and vibrancy. In: The vibrancy effect. ebook . NAi Uitgevers, V2_, Rotterdam. ISBN 978-94-6208-032-4

Norman, Sally Jane (2012) Staging live art, a-life, a-life art. In: VIDA Art and Artificial Life. Fundacion Telefonica, Madrid, pp. 110-119. ISBN 9788415282044

Dunn, Stuart, Woolford, Kirk, Norman, Sally-Jane, White, Martin and Barker, Leon (2012) Motion in place: a case study of archaeological reconstruction using motion capture. Revive the past: proceedings of the 39th conference in computer applications and quantitative methods in archaeology. pp. 98-106.

Dunn, Stuart, Woolford, Kirk, Barker, Leon, Taylor, Milo, Norman, Sally-Jane, White, Martin, Hedges, Mark, Bailey, Helen, Fulford, Michael and Clarke, Amanda (2012) Motion in place: a case study of archaeological reconstruction using motion capture. In: Revive the past: proceeding of the 39th Conference on Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology. Pallas Publications, pp. 98-106. ISBN 978085550662

Dunn, Stuart, Hedges, Mark, Woolford, Kirk, Barker, Leon, Norman, Sally-Jane, Taylar, Milo, White, Martin, Fulford, Michael, Clarke, Amanda and Bailey, Helen (2011) Motion in place: archaeological reconstruction and motion capture. In: CAA 2011: Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archeology, 12-16 April 2011, Beijing, China. (In Press)

Fuller, Ted, Warren, Lorraine and Norman, Sally-Jane (2011) Creative methodologies for understanding a creative industry. In: Entrepreneurship and the Creative Economy: Process, Policy and Practice. Edward Elgar, pp. 79-96. ISBN 978-1-84844-769-1

Norman, Sally-Jane (2011) Shifting media culture perspectives. In: Practice to policy: international perspectives on the policy implications of a cultural sector in transition. Virtueel Platform, pp. 7-17. ISBN 9789490108007

Norman, Sally-Jane (2011) An arts centre for Sussex: from the Gardner to the Attenborough. In: Making the future: a history of the University of Sussex. University of Sussex, Falmer, pp. 304-318.

Woolford, Kirk, Blackwell, Alan F., Norman, Sally-Jane and Chevalier, Cecile (2010) Crafting a Critical Technical Practice. Leonardo, 43 (2). pp. 202-203. ISSN 0024-094X

Norman, Sally-Jane and Lawson, Sian E.M. (2009) AMUC: Associated Motion Capture User Categories. Philosophical Transactions A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 367 (18). pp. 2771-2780. ISSN 1471-2962

Norman, Sally-Jane (2008) Anatomies of live art. In: Anatomy live: performance and the operating theatre. Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam, pp. 187-204. ISBN 9789053565162