Video Courtesy of Fort Worth | Loop, by EKUMEN, a co-production of Quartier des spectacles Partnership and Ekumen, distributed by QDSinternational.
Weekend Themes:
3.14 - 3.17: Get In the Loop
3.22 - 3.24: Magic of Cinema featuring Light Up Chatt Parade
3.29 - 3.31: Hip N Hop
4.5 - 4.7: Retro Rewind
4.12 - 4.14: Pure Imagination
Rock the Riverfront Featuring
Loop by Ekumen
A participatory work that will spark the imagination. The Chattanooga Green will shimmer with the mechanical poetry of Loop’s 12 giant zoetropes.
March 14 - April 14, 2024
Chattanooga Green
Free & Open to the Public
8:30am - 8:30pm
Loop is an interactive work that plays short flipbook-style movies inspired by Quebec literature. At the center of each giant wheel is a music box to provide accompaniment for the hand-drawn animations. The work is inspired by the zoetrope, an optical toy invented in the 19th century. Loop is a hybrid of the music box, zoetrope and railway handcar. Sit down inside the zoetrope, pump the bar, and make the image cylinder turn. The pictures will spring into motion. The images, tinted by a strobe, are reminiscent of the earliest movies. The speed of the whirring pictures, the frequency at which the light flickers and the tempo of the music are all determined by how fast you move the bar. Have fun!
Thank You To Our Sponsors:
Hospitality Partner:
Discounted Rates for: March 15 - 17 | March 22 - 24 | March 29 - 31 | April 5 - 7 | April 12 - 14
Full Credits
Concept and Execution: Olivier Girouard, Jonathan Villeneuve and Ottoblix
Illustrators: Gérard Dubois, Marianne Ferrer, Estelle Frenette-Vallières, Éléonore Goldberg, Jacques Goldstyn, Pinabel, Camille Pomerlo, Mathieu Potvin, Todd Stewart, Amélie Tourangeau, Marie-Hélène Turcotte, Urban9 Design Animations: Mélanie Boudreau Blanchard, Trina Daniel, Galilé Marion-Gauvin, Daria Pelsher et Mathieu Tremblay (Ottoblix)
Industrial Design: Sébastien Dallaire (generic design)
Electronic Design & Programming: Thomas Ouellet Fredericks
Technical Support: Adsum Lab
Mechanical Consultant: Jérôme D. Roy (Terrafirma)
Audio Programming: Dominic Thibault
Sound: Olivier Girouard
Engineers: Concept paradesign
Co-production: EKUMEN and Quartier des Spectacles Partnership
Distribution: QDSinternational
Executive Production – Touring: Jack World
Creative Intention
"Jonathan returned from a trip to Berlin, where he’d visited the Technology Museum. He saw all kinds of mechanical inventions there, including the zoetrope, a device, from before movies were invented, that animates a series of images when you spin its cylinder. Then, thinking of hamster wheels, we decided to build a vertical zoetrope. So we combined three mechanical elements: the railway push-car (like the ones made famous by Bugs Bunny cartoons), the music box and the zoetrope. We came up with the idea and sketched out the project just one week before the deadline for submitting proposals!" Jonathan Villeneuve, an artist with a love of gadgetry, and Olivier Girouard, a composer and the director of the Ekumen studio.