Overcoming Reserve – Supporting Professional Appropriation of Interactive Costumes

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DOI

Deploying wearable technologies in the performing arts not only concerns costume wearers but affects further stakeholders whose work is impacted by the interactive effects or who help maintain the technology. Beyond the wearer, literature neglects how these other stakeholders engage with interactive costumes, though a performance production is based on the contribution of many parties. We conducted a longitudinal study to examine how stakeholders of a youth ballet production experience and appropriate interactive costuming. Our findings suggest that user experiences vary according to stakeholders’ closeness to the costume, background and taste, the costume interaction mode and social environment. We expand existing models of technology appropriation with two novel technology relations: professional reserve and polite indifference. Based on these, we suggest integration into existing practices, to design for the show, and create positive experiences to incorporate interactive costumes in the performing arts and discuss relevance for other professional fields.