Faculty of Arts & Science

Digital Futures

Leanna Barwick

Playshop: GradEx108 Creative Coaching Demos - Karaoke Edition

Playshop: GradEx108 Creative Coaching Demos - Karaoke Edition is an interactive installation that uses music as a metaphor to express less known inner aspects of self and relationship with others. Individuals or partners can book a demo Relationship Systems Intelligence (RSI) coaching session to discover marginalized aspects of self, and relationship to self and others, through exploring senses and relational, experiential information. The purpose of the coaching is to help raise awareness of self and others through discovering what is the voice, and what does it have to sing about. Appointments can be scheduled via the online creativerising.ca website booking system. Sessions are approximately 30-45 minutes in length, and will happen during GradEx hours from Thurs May 4 & Fri May 5 from 10:30am to 7:00pm, Saturday May 6 & Sunday May 7 from 10:30am to 4pm.

“Inspired by private karaoke rooms in Toronto's Little Korea that the artist has enjoyed over a lifetime, this installation looks to recreate the aesthetic of these intimate spaces that allows for solo or shared activities together; time shared not necessarily talking with each other, although depths of connection and intimacy are shared, and opportunity for positive connections, as well as cathartic outcomes through the emotional release the song allows. Most talking is frantically planning the next song.At one point the artist discovered a "happy hour" at what soon became their favourite karaoke spot. During happy hour, from 4:30pm to 9:00pm on Monday to Thurs, it was the cost of an hour, for that whole window. Being creative and resourceful, the artist, would use these spaces to coach and meet clients, to keep things interesting, and in these situations started to develop coaching tools around this game like personal development experience.Techniques that draw from Co-Active coaching, Organizational Relationship Systems Coaching, Neuro-Consciousness Transformational coaching are used in an active, playful and creative way to explore aspects of self and aspects of relationship that might not always be heard to raise awareness of self, discover new information, make more resonant choices.In addition to Toronto k-town realness, the installation brings together a physical computing element, and has a sensor based interactive light and sound design control console, that offers a gamified collaborative element to the overall karaoke room.”