Throughout 2015, Robert Walton and Jason Maling are developing a responsive, time-based, narrative experience that moves across media, bodies and technologies, between public and private spaces.

Dark Telephony is controlled by call-centre technology, and will be mediated by an interactive telephone system via individual mobile devices, social media and its human avatars. In this iteration the Dark Telephony system will manifest a live performance for a small group of participants. Part call-centre horror story, part spectral encounter with oneself, the work exploits the uneasy relationship we have with automated disembodied telephone systems. It plays on that vague sense that our mundane communications are not all they seem, and an all-pervasive and non locatable ‘other’ might actually be tracking and directing our movements. Participants will literally ring in to be wrung out.

We propose a performative presentation in which 8 or 16 symposium participants are invited to take part in a live trial of the work.

Dark Telephony is an iteration of Walton and Maling’s three year collaboration with Arts House Melbourne through an In Your Hands commission, which is funded by the Australia Council’s Digital Theatre Fund.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS: Participants will need to register their interest prior to the performance and supply their mobile numbers. Participants are also required to attend the event with their mobile phones switched on.