NW Spotlight | danielle Mackenzie Long reflects on NWXR
New Works Spotlight
A look inside our multifaceted, value-driven, community-responsive service organization
Beyond performances and programs, New Works is part of a living, evolving dance ecosystem. This monthly blog series highlight the unseen moments—the collaborations, reflections, and shifts that shape our community. It’s about the ripples of artist support, learning, and shared growth. Each story offers a glimpse into the evolving needs of the dance community and how we respond.
danielle Mackenzie Long reflects on NWXR
By: danielle Mackenzie Long
I have been tending to a growing self-taught digital practice under the umbrella of extended reality for the past two and a half years. The expansive possibilities of what movement can be when it is shared through technological applications has been a driving curiosity of mine since this still recent beginning. I wanted to learn more about motion capture because focusing all my energy towards live movement was not satisfying enough at the time.
I participated in NWXR in 2023, rapidly uncovering what “XR”, or “extended reality” meant.
an extension of my body
an extension of myself
an extension of my capacity
These uncoverings started shaping a new pillar of my artistic practice. Quickly my fascination with motion capture grew as I learned to apply this technique within the open source animation software Blender, and eventually the free game engine software Unity.
A domino effect then followed; I concluded the program with a one minute animation of a ribcage. I researched this ribcage. I expanded it into a multi part live performance and half complete digital zine.
Then I got stuck at the end of 2024. Using Unity was really hard.
I needed a new entry point to try and orient myself in creating within this beastly software. I wanted to be in a generative state of learning with others without the pressure of creating something finite. As a result I found the 2025 iteration of NWXR was that place I needed to go to.
Gathering with other artists who held varying relations to technological integrations in their creative practices, we collaboratively researched how digital tools can activate our senses and orient our humanity in relation to the machine. As we found ourselves using digital tools to map out our understanding of a city and embody the experiences of residing in a place, another map was also emerging in my own practice. During this process where experimenting without expectation was the heartbeat of the program I started finding a new sense of inspiration and a network of like-minded individuals invested in how to navigate the overwhelm that a digital machine collaborator often brings. Digital baggage if you will.
Having permission to test out small ideas and connect with others of similar passions helped clarify how exactly I want this medium to be artistically employed within my practice. Score based durational performance, sculptures in the physical and digital forms, and movement of a tangentially present human revealed themselves as key components I want to incorporate when creating.
In the weeks that followed the conclusion of this year’s iteration of the program I found myself returning back to Unity to try again, with new projects on the horizon, and reinvigorated inspiration to reorient myself to this machine.
One of the two projects I started making was A Suspension of Electrical Silk.
Spiders and jellyfish take on bizarre forms of tenderness as they merge with human movement patterns in this work. A Suspension of Electrical Silk is the meeting point of live performance, motion capture and film, set among an installation made of electrical wires. It interrogates how to build methods of defense that are supple and tender, as a tool for protection. Drawing from symbols of femininity, monstrosity, motherhood, and domestic care, an ongoing exploration of abstracting gender identity unfolds.
I strive to have my work be upheld through responsive human connection rooted in caretaking through technology, not only seen in the product, but present within the process of creating a work. By participating in the most recent NWXR program I was able to draw that conclusion.
This new work is a turning point in my practice. I had been compiling small curiosities of things that my earlier works had scratched the surface of, but never fully addressed. In so many ways A Suspension of Electrical Silk is a direct reflection and deepening of what’s come before in my work. I find that fascinating. I love the reimagining of the previous.
The work has taught me that beginning at an ending is powerful because it undoes our perception of what labour is. The more I employ technology in my practice the more I feel the need to highlight the imperfect nature of human decision making that is woven into this kind of work, yet often goes unnoticed. A reminder that technologies at the root are made by humans — prone to error and the beauty that offers. I’m still experimenting with forms of presentation and formats that this project may ultimately be. I want to continue weaving this web to find out where it will live best.
The universe of XR opened up to me two and a half years ago. It told me and eleven year old danielle that math (something I’ve always loved and been good at) and art can coexist. They are essential tools to letting yourself be seen and oriented in this form of reality.
A Suspension of Electrical Silk is produced by Company 605 and funded by the BC Arts Council.
About danielle Mackenzie Long
(danielle use a lowercase “d” because they desire to navigate the world by easing into spaces. They go by their full name to acknowledge my maternal lineage.)
danielle Mackenzie Long, a queer emerging artist, resides on the stolen and unceded territory of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh, and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm nations. They seek to use new media and film to liberate gender non-conforming dance artists to create work that surpasses gendered bodies through various means of visual presentation and audience access.
Their creative practice has been supported by a recent commission from Company 605, as well as residencies with Toronto Dance Theatre (Pilot Episodes) and New Works. At this time danielle’s performance practice is being expanded through engagements with Action at a Distance/Vanessa Goodman, Shion Skye Carter, and self checkout/Lamont. Their past works have been shown through GRRL HAUS CINEMA, XINEMA, New Works, FAVA, and Cinevolution among others.
As Co-Artistic Director and Curator in Residence with Festival of Recorded Movement (FORM), they work alongside a small team of creatives, supporting the seeds of creations by Youth and Emerging artists whose works speak to the theme of “recorded movement.” They strive to navigate academic structures with an emphasis on curiosity, refusal, and rest, most recently through their studies at the School for Poetic Computation (New York).
Why New Works Spotlights?
New Works delivers many unique programs, in many different ways, in support of many communities of artists. If you’ve ever asked a New Works staff member, “so, what does New Works do exactly?”, you’ve likely been met with a rambling run on sentence and a laundry list of exciting programs and projects that we have on the go. Up close it may look a little messy, but take a step back and you will see the container: all of our work exists in response to current gaps in the needs of the dance community. This looks like performance opportunities, partnership and collaboration, professional development, teaching engagements, mentorship, skills training, and many more. And we are just one small piece of this vitally diverse dance milieu.
We envision a healthy artist-centred arts ecosystem where connection, collaboration, and opportunity is celebrated beyond the container of our own organization. Through this ongoing blog series, we invite you to join us in witnessing artist experience through and beyond New Works programs, and in celebration of our living, breathing, shared communities.
Photos by Alger Liang.