Highlights from Praxis Theatre’s Encounters with Social Media

The following edited excerpts demonstrate Praxis Theatre’s approaches to social media, and specifically what Artistic Director Michael Wheeler calls “social design” or “the strategic implementation of social media to deepen or broaden the nature of an artistic project.” As noted by Broverman in the previous article, Wheeler outlines the three categories of social design which Praxis Theatre employs: “social media content ABOUT the work; social media content that INTEGRATES with the work; and social media content that IS the work” (see “What is Social Design” on michaelcwheeler.com).

1. Social Media about the Work

In 2011–12 Praxis Theatre’s Artistic Producer Aislinn Rose participated in Out The Window, a play that explores playwright Liza Balkan’s journey through the justice system after witnessing the death of Otto Vass, a man beaten by police during an altercation in a downtown Toronto parking lot. The docudrama presents material from court transcripts and interviews with police and experts to reflect on problems of accountability in Toronto’s justice system and in public care for the mentally ill. Out The Window was presented at The Theatre Centre, Toronto, on 17–20 March 2012. See outthewindowcollective.com.

Rose was tasked with capturing the large quantity of information that fuelled development of the show. Serving as the production’s social media dramaturg and designer, Rose developed The Brain, an online companion using mind-mapping software called Personal Brain that offered a way to organize and creatively represent this complex source material.

The following is an explanation of the goals of The Brain provided by Rose in the weeks leading up to the show:

1. 1). Create an online visualization of the huge web of information currently existing in its totality only in Liza’s brain;

2. 2). Provide open source access to members of the audience where they can interact with the show’s content before and after the show itself. … Mind-mapping software allows us to take the old hand-drawn mapping/brainstorming technique, and put it online in a way that users can navigate according to personal preferences and interest.

She also notes that the form of The Brain inspired “some design aesthetics for the Theatre Centre presentation.” The Brain was also dramaturgically useful for creating a tighter show, as it enabled Balkan to cut certain sections from the script, knowing that these important pieces of information would continue to live on in another place accessible to the public.

An archive of The Brain can be accessed at outthewindowcollective.com/the-brain/. Rose considers The Brain incomplete—a taste of what is possible with this kind of dramaturgical tool—as there are hundreds of other further documents that could be included.

Introducing: The Brain

Excerpt from online post, 20 February 2012
by Aislinn Rose

Due to the constantly evolving nature of Liza Balkan’s work on Out The Window, “The Brain” was conceived as a way to experiment with the idea of capturing Liza’s knowledge in an interactive tool that would allow audience members, and the public at large, to navigate the immense amount of information according to their own interests.

Below I offer you an embedded version of The Brain, as well as a basic tutorial on how to make your way through the brain’s many “thoughts.” You can also go straight to the full “WebBrain” version in order to navigate on a larger scale. A work-in-progress, our “Out The Window: The Brain” offers links to several topics of research, a wealth of images and sound designs from earlier iterations, excerpts from court transcripts, some of which we have recorded with actors, and much more.

How to Navigate The Brain

The Brain is made up of “parent thoughts” and “child thoughts.” Often when you click on a thought, it will reveal several new child thoughts to explore.

Clicking on thoughts may also lead you to sources of information, like URLs to articles and images, as well as sound and video files. When you click on these thoughts, you’ll be given a preview of...