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© Sylvie Bissonnette, 2013
Sylvie Bissonnette's recent research examines the boundaries between humans and machines and the cultural relations between cinema and science in animated images. She holds a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from UC Davis, a master's degree in Film Studies, and a B.F.A. in Film Production from Concordia University. She writes widely on film and theatre and has specialized in studies of the work of Robert Lepage. She also has experience with making multimedia performances.
Sylvie is currently working on a book project on Robert Lepage's cinema. A second book project examines the ways in which animated figures and avatars are extensions of the human body and transform our understanding of life and 'the human.' A third project examines viewers' embodied engagement with the microscopic scale and the macroscopic scale in explorations of the body interior and cosmic journeys. A special issue on "Animating Space and Scalar Travels" is forthcoming in 2014 in animation: an interdisciplinary journal.
Work published include articles in Screen, The New Review of Film and Television Studies, The Contemporary Theatre Review, NVCQ, as well as book chapters on theatricality in film and film adaptation in Stages of Reality and From Camera Lens to Critical Lens. Sylvie has articles in progress on playing with life in video games, cross-ethnic casting in Quebec cinema, remediation and translation in multimedia theatre made in Quebec, the perception of biological motion in scientific animation, and lightning sketch films.
“The Two Cultures in Robert Lepage’s La face cachée de la lune.” New Review of Film and Television Studies 8.4 (December 2010): 372-395.
“Historical Interculturalism in Robert Lepage’s Elsinore.” Contemporary Theatre Review 20.1 (April 2010): 40-55.
“Cyborg Brains in Robert Lepage’s Possible Worlds.” Screen 50.4 (December 2009): 392-410.
“La théâtralité cinématographique engagée.” [Committed Filmic Theatricality.] Nouvelles «vues» sur le cinéma québécois 8 (Winter 2008): 1-29.
“La dualité sexuelle d’Hamlet et ses représentations.” [Hamlet’s Sexual Duality and its Representations.] Dire: La revue des cycles supérieurs de l’Université de Montréal 14.3 (Spring 2005): 42-45.
“Committed Theatricality.” Stages of Reality: Theatricality in Cinema. Eds. André Loiselle and Jeremy Maron. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012.
“Adaptation as Confession in Robert Lepage’s Le confessionnal.” From Camera Lens to Critical Lens: A Collection of Best Essays on Film Adaptation. Ed. Rebecca Housel. London: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2006. 73-90.
“Freda Chapple et Chiel Kattenbelt (dir.), Intermediality in Theatre and Performance.” L’Annuaire théâtral 45 (Spring 2010): 201-206.
“Aleksandar Dundjerovic. The Cinema of Robert Lepage: The Poetics of Memory.” Nouvelles «vues» sur le cinéma québécois 2 (Fall 2004): 1-5.
“Québec / USA, culture de substitution: les tournages étrangers au Québec.” [Quebec/USA, Substitution Culture: Foreign Films Made in Quebec. ] Nouvelles «vues» sur le cinéma québécois 3 (Winter 2005): 1-12.
“Dualités poétiques de Robert Lepage.” [Poetic Dualities of Robert Lepage.] La Revue de la Cinémathèque 89 (Sept-Dec 2007): 19.
Interview. Nicoud, Anabelle. “Cinq questions à… Sylvie Bissonnette. Critique de cinéma et spécialiste de Robert Lepage.” [Five Questions To... Sylvie Bissonnette. Cinema Critic and Specialist of Robert Lepage.] La Presse, Montreal, November 24, 2007, Cinéma, p.14.
“Playing with Life in Video Games”, The Society for Literature, Science and the Arts (SLSA), September 28, 2012. (Panel co-organizer with Olivia Banner: Nonhuman Animation and the Digital Danse Macabre)
“Scalar Travels: Animating the Limits of the Body and Life”, The Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Boston, March 22, 2012. (Panel organizer: Animating Space and Scalar Travels)
“Hybrid Citizens in Cyberpunk Animation”, The Society for Cinema and Media Studies, New Orleans, March 10, 2011. (Panel organizer: “Animated Citizenship”)
“Posthumanist Resistance: Documenting the Conquest of Outer Space and Inner Space”, The Society for Literature, Science and the Arts (SLSA), Charlotte, North Carolina, November 15, 2008. (Panel co-organizer with Colin Milburn: “Posthuman Mediations”)
“Double Identity: Cross-casting in Robert Lepage’s Nô”, Film Studies Association of Canada (FSAC), Vancouver, Ontario, June 3, 2008. (Panel organizer: “Cinema and Its Double: Robert Lepage’s Stages and Screens”)
“Remediating Lightning Sketch Films: From Early Animation to Recent Multimedia Performances”, The Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Chicago, March 2013.
“Translation and Remediation in Contemporary Intermedial Theatre”, Association of Comparative Literature of America, Vancouver, April 1, 2011.
“Life and Posthuman Metamorphoses in Animation”, The Society for Literature, Science and the Arts (SLSA), Indianapolis, October 29, 2010.
“The Two Cultures in Robert Lepage’s La face cachée de la lune (Far Side of the Moon)”, The Western Canadian Studies Association: Canadian Studies: On the Edge, Davis, February 20, 2009.
“Magic and Adaptation: The Illusionist and The Prestige”, 2008 Joint Conference of the National Popular Culture and American Culture Associations (PCA/ACA), San Francisco, March 21, 2008.
“Poetic Vision of Complexity in Robert Lepage’s Films”, Quebec Cinema Conference, Glasgow, March 22, 2007.
“Fiction in Local Films Shot in Quebec in 1908”, Avènement du cinéma en Amérique du Nord (1893-1909), Godin Hotel, Montreal, November 28, 2006.
“Historical Interculturalism in Robert Lepage’s Elsinore”, First International Conference on Robert Lepage, Canada House, London, June 2, 2006.
The wilderness
I imagine
baths its feet
in the ocean
loses its mind
in a maze of words
surfing on the Net.
1. Blue Screen (SB, 2007)
2. Nocturnal Avatars (SB, 2007)
3. My Twisted Leg (SB, 2007)
4. Plagiarism (SB, 2007)
5. Virtual Corpses (SB, 2007)
6. Traveling Through the Dark (William Stafford, 1962)
7. The Edge of Wilson River (SB, 2007)
8. "In passing with my mind" (William Carlos Williams, 1923)
9. The Scattered Pieces (SB, 2007)
10. Hailstorm (SB, 2007)
11. Finding Nemo (SB, 2007)
12. The Aquarium in Quebec City (SB, 2007)
Performer: Paula Dawson
Film, animation, original poetry: Sylvie Bissonnette
Performed in lab A at UC Davis, June 1st, 2007.
1. Bienvenue Mesdames et Messieurs
2. The Puppet Dance
3. The Mermaid
4. Split Brain
5. The Fragmented Self
6. The Body Emblazoned
7. The Wound
8. Flip-books
9. The Some of my Parts
10. Hopping Cells
11. Trance Missions
12. Second Life
13. Bioshock
Director: Sylvie Bissonnette
Choreographer and performer: Tyler Eash
Dancer and performer: Claire M.C. Blackstock
Sound Design/Electronic Music Composition: Isaac Blackstock for pieces 1, 3, 4, 8, 10, and 12.
Sound Design/Electronic Music Composition: Pascal Laflamme (creation and musician) and Sylvie Bissonnette (sequencing) for piece 2
Sound Editing and Video Editing: Sylvie Bissonnette
Video and computer animation: Sylvie Bissonnette
Computer animation and molecular design for piece 12: Sébastien Hamel
Music: Skinny Puppy’s The Choke and Rammstein’s Du Hart
Original poetry: Sylvie Bissonnette
Poem for piece 6: Shakespeare’s Sonnet 20
Poem for piece 7: John Donne
Set Design: Tyler Eash with the assistance of Der Her and Dominique Littleton
Stage Manager: Devin Collins
Department staff and faculty members at UC Davis
Performed in the University Club at UC Davis, May 23-24, 2008.
