Waiting. Penelope's Blanket

Waiting is a performance piece based on The Odyssey. While Penelope was waiting for Ulysses she was pressed by her suitors to make a decision and marry one of them. She said she will choose only when she had finished knitting her father in law's funeral pall so she worked on it during the day while secretly unraveling what she had done over night.

In the performance I play Song for Ulysses by knitting and unknitting a long blanket, mimicking Penelope in her waiting. The action and the music are slow and sad but carry the hope to have the loved one coming back home.

The instrument I use is called Penelope's blanket, a blanket knitted with regular and conductive yarn with soft sensors and switches made up of knitting needles communicating with arduino and Max/MSP. Devon Dagworthy knitted the blanket on her knitting machine and the song was composed originally for this piece by the composer Maria Linares.

Waiting was performed for the first time at the NIME performance in South Paw, Brooklyn, on December 15, 2009.

Audio from the performance at South Paw:

Carolina Vallejo: "Waiting - Penelope's blanket" from Nisma Z on Vimeo.

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