Scheherazade's sea: a mixed media, multi-sensory installation and performance

Abstract

Scheherazade’s Sea is an interdisciplinary creative work, which brings together

music, visual art, literary text, digital media, and performance art. Interdisciplinary

creativity has existed for centuries in history. In fact, the ancients of different

civilisations viewed the disciplines of science and art as inseparable. The late

nineteenth century and early twentieth century saw a resurgence of interdisciplinary

interest in the form of artistic collaborations among proponents of the different arts

forms, mainly music, visual art, theatre and dance. Today, this coalescence now

includes digital and electronic media. However, such works focus mainly on the

more dominant distal senses of sight and sound and fail to consider the

multimodality of natural sensory perception in the experience of art, and many of

these works are performed in settings where artists are separated from audience by

physical and psychological barriers. In Scheherazade’s Sea, I shall address the

limitations of prevalent approaches, by including the proximal senses, removing the

traditional physical barriers and encouraging audience participation.

On another level, Scheherazade’s Sea serves as a vehicle for exploration and

reflection of the inherent sensory and cognitive peculiarities associated with

Asperger’s Syndrome, and their possible influences upon creativity and artistic

expression. Sensory and cognitive idiosyncrasy is a common feature in Asperger’s

Syndrome. Individuals suffer from extremes of either heightened sensitivity or low

arousal to external sensory stimuli, and their innate cognitive patterns differ from that

of the typical majority. As a result, the sensory and cognitive world of a person with

Autistic Spectrum Disorder can be fragmented, disjointed and confusing. While there

exists substantial literature about famous artists with Asperger’s Syndrome and

various aspects of their creativity, there is, to date, limited documentation from the

perspective of the artist with Asperger’s Syndrome, using an original

interdisciplinary work to illustrate the possible ways in which sensory and cognitive

differences may affect and influence creative choices and outcomes. By charting and

examining the features and various processes in the creation of Scheherazade’s Sea, I

hope to discover and contribute more insights into this area of interdisciplinary study.

The purpose of this examination is not to add to the already vast body of

programmes aimed at social rehabilitation and adaptation to the neurotypical world,

but rather to open more avenues for the identification and development of innate

abilities in autistic individuals. My intention is not to ‘fix what is broken’, but to

discover and empower beauty in the unusual and the different.