Conceived by Grisha Coleman, echo::system is a series of multi-platform, site-specific, live performance installations, referred to as Action Stations. Natural habitats such as the bottom of the ocean floor, an open prairie land, a volcanic island, a desert, provide the information from which the team of collaborators develop physical, virtual and mythological material systems to create alternative environments. By research and observation of natural and urban habitats, echo::system is an experience of ‘constructed’ nature that looks at integrated systems and resonant patterns in the landscape to create a surreal parallel world and unearth unexpected experiences for its inhabitants.

A unique collaborative process engages biologists, architects, digital, sound and video designers and performers. This team researches the dynamic behavior and “natural” biorhythms of specific ecosystems to create a physical installation based on real and metaphorical data, a digital model that triggers, connects and governs events in the physical environments. A mythology about the creation of the environment and its inhabitants builds the story for the work.

In an environment made “live” by the integration of interactive technology, performers and audience move within a full sensory landscape - witnessing the story that unfolds as a way to re-examine contemporary urban life. By engaging in discourse between diverse disciplines of composition, choreography, architecture, writing, digital code and the visual arts, echo::system questions one perspective to illuminate another, including science and its methods. echo:: system creates a new awareness for collaborators and audiences alike of the potential relevance of live art, the resonance between art and science and the impact of technology on the American landscape.