Leslie Deere

Key details:

Department:
Production Arts
Role:
Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Leslie Deere

Dr Leslie Deere is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Guildhall School of Music & Drama, where she works within the Guildhall Production Studio on questions of digital performance, immersive technologies, and the relationship between embodied presence and virtual environments. Her interdisciplinary formation spans classical dance training, Sonic Arts, and a PhD in Fine Art and Extended Reality Technologies from Glasgow School of Art, and her research and creative practice are mutually constitutive, spanning audiovisual performance, gesture-controlled XR systems, sound installation, and participatory immersive environments.
Central to this work is her concept of 'The Embodied Instrument', which positions the body as both compositional agent and site of perceptual inquiry. This through-line connects her performance practice with her broader investigations into how multisensory, interactive systems generate meaning, agency, and experience for participants and audiences alike. Her work engages questions of spectatorship, co-presence, and the shifting boundaries between performer, system, and environment.
Her practice has been exhibited and performed internationally at venues including MoMA PS1, the BFI, CCA Glasgow, the Whitstable Biennale, and Kew Gardens. Her academic outputs include contributions to the Springer volume Arts and Computational Culture, the Media Art History Journal, and The Palgrave Handbook of Sound and Music Visualisation. Her work has been presented most recently at the 18th Triennial of Art and Technology, Ammerman Center, Connecticut College.

 

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Recent Research Outputs

Array Infinitive

Deere, L. (2025). Array Infinitive: Vibrance Festival of Light and Sound. Digital or Visual Media https://www.gsmd.ac.uk/whats-on/vibrance

2025

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Digital Traces: Investigating movement, live sound making and visual feedback in VR dance improvisation

Deere, L. (2025). Digital Traces: Investigating movement, live sound making and visual feedback in VR dance improvisation: Proceedings of EVA London 2025 (EVA 2025). 146-149. https://doi.org/10.14236/ewic/EVA2025.29

2025

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Action at a Distance: Reformatting the Paradigm of Spectatorship through Virtual Gestures and Audiovisuals

Deere, L. (2024). Action at a Distance: Reformatting the Paradigm of Spectatorship through Virtual Gestures and Audiovisuals. ARTERIAIS , 10(18). https://periodicos.ufpa.br/index.php/ppgartes/index

2024

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ARray - Turning up the volume in the costume department

Shorten, D., & Deere, L. (2024). ARray - Turning up the volume in the costume department. https://ncace.ac.uk/2024/07/01/guildhall-production-studio-array-turning-up-the-volume-in-the-costume-department/

2024

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A VR Performance

Deere, L. (2024). A VR Performance: Solo Performance and Group Exhibition . Exhibition

2024

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Movement Matters: Embodied expression in VR

Deere, L. (2024). Movement Matters: Embodied expression in VR: Proceedings of EVA London 2024 (EVA 2024). Paper presented at Electronic Visualisation and the Arts, London. https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14236/ewic/EVA2024.6

2024

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The Arts and Computational Culture: Real and Virtual Worlds

Deere, L. (2024). The Arts and Computational Culture: Real and Virtual Worlds: Performance and Virtual Reality: The Stage as a Multidimensional Environment. (1 ed.) (Springer Series on Cultural Computing). Springer Nature.

2024

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Mindscapes Exhibition

Deere, L. (2023). Mindscapes Exhibition. Exhibition

2023

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Action at a Distance: Altered states through virtual gestures and audio-visuals

Deere, L. (2022). Action at a Distance: Altered states through virtual gestures and audio-visuals. Paper presented at EVA .

2022

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Array Infinitive

Deere, L. (2022). Array Infinitive: Solo Exhibition / Performances. Exhibition

2022

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