Output details

All For Claire

Animation for BBC Big Screens and various Film Festivals.

Working with international dancer and performer Claire Cunningham, McKeown utilised digital technologies and the studio environment to explore concepts of power and provenance in disabled women. McKeown explores perceptions of normality and difference that exist in contemporary culture and feminist critique and through the work, challenges and questions those perceptions and values, using animation as a vehicle of expression, creating a discourse about ability and disability in women.

Commissioned by DadaFest in Liverpool (£4K) McKeown designed the animation to be accessible and appeal to a broad age range for the BBC Big Screens. It deliberately has no dialogue. The work is 7 minutes long, and is made from over 20 minutes of Motion Capture material using techniques associated with feature films and computer games. The work references and builds on the work of earlier choreographers such as Merce Cunningham, who experimented with dance and technology in a postmodern environment, and provides a framework for further technology and dance related exploration. Dancer Claire Cunningham worked with McKeown in Teesside University’s Motion Capture laboratory, providing the performances on which the animation is based. Many thousands of individual frames were generated in 3D and the final piece was provided to the BBC early November 2010.“All for Claire”’ was produced for Dadafest International 2010 and was awarded ‘Best Experimental Film’ at the UK’s premiere Deaf film festival – Deaffest on the 21st of May 2011. “All for Claire” has been shown internationally at several venues including Calgary, Canada and the Bosifest in Bosnia as well as at the New York City International Film Festival during August 2011, “All for Claire” was shown on the BBC Big Screens nationwide during November and December 2010 and again in December 2011 to a huge million plus UK audience.