In my research to find “kinetic fabrics,” I had no idea what I would find because I had never researched just this topic specifically. I ended up on a Pinterest board that someone had put together of “art, technology, kinetic, design” and found so many cool projects. One that caught my eye was Lesia Trubat’s electronic ballet shoes.

The concept of her project was to collect “traces” of a ballet dancer’s movements and represent them as visual sensations. Using a Lilypad Arduino microcontroller, she focused on recording the pressures and actions that occurred through contact with the floor. The movements are translated into a visual experience that dancers can refer to afterwards in order to interpret their choreography in a different medium.

I find this project quite beautiful, because as a dancer, I have never thought to pay attention to the whole picture my feet might paint as I dance. It’s always about the individual steps, or the sets of steps, landing correctly but this project created a new medium of art without adding any additional work for the artist, just the wearable technology.

Link: https://www.designboom.com/design/lesia-trubat-e-traces-ballet-shoes-phone-app-10-24-2014/

The project also reminded me of one I came across a while ago: “Netflix Socks.” These were socks that turned off the TV/paused your show if you fell asleep while watching. Wearable kinetic fabrics have such a wide range of opportunities to explore, from art to simple tasks like this. Very excited to continue learning 🙂