During the Divided By Resistance performance, the custom built software - DreamEngine - analysed real-time EEG output from the sleeping performer and delivered expression in the form of remixes of the archived text narratives and quick time movies. Audience members were invited to 'communicate' with the sleeping performer during periods of REM sleep. The REM activity was indicated to the 'communicator' via an activated red light source in the gallery space, triggered by infra-red sensors worn over the sleeper's eyes. This red light was a cue for the 'communicator' to administer a series of codified questions and statements in the form of mild electrical stimulation. The electrical stimulation, reminiscent of morse code, was delivered via electrodes from a TENS electrotherapy unit connected to the soles of the sleeper's feet. Feedback to the 'communicator' was delivered via the vibrating pads of a chair - the seat of consciousness - on which they reclined: the sleeper's left hemisphere beta waves vibrating the left side of the head; right hemisphere theta waves vibrating the right buttock and so forth. Any change in the sleeping performer's brain state, as a consequence of the 'communication' was therefore physically experienced by the 'communicator' via the vibrating pads in the seat of consciousness, as well as the remixes of text narratives and quick time movies.
Divided By Resistance constituted creative research into how signals from the external environment are symbolically incorporated and represented by the dreaming mind/brain.
