When Alvin Erasga Tolentino, Peter Courtemanche, Carol Sawyer, and Ken Gregory first mounted Shadow Machine at the Ironworks a decade ago, they had no idea just how fitting the heritage building would be for their multidisciplinary work. Located on Alexander Street in Railtown, the arts venue—a former machine shop—is filled with the kind of paraphernalia the artists sought to explore in their mixed-media production inspired by Vancouver’s industrial history.

“Ironworks has these wooden casts of propellers that are just beautiful,” Sawyer, a visual artist and vocalist, tells the Straight in an interview at the Scotiabank Dance Centre along with Tolentino and Gregory. “We found ledgers that listed everything they made there in the ’20s and ’30s. There would be a ship’s name—say, the Marietta; they were recasting the main propeller—and the names of the people who worked on it. It was as much a social history as an industrial history of Vancouver.

“I became interested in the sawmills, trains, shipyards, and machine shops that used to line Coal Harbour and False Creek,” she adds. “The redevelopment of those two areas is a major change in the city that has arisen in the time that I’ve lived here.”

Says Tolentino, “It’s amazing how much the city has changed. And now computers are our machines.”

Dancer-choreographer Tolentino, Sawyer, sound and installation artist Courtemanche—all from Vancouver—and Winnipeg multidisciplinary artist Gregory concurred that the year 2010 was an ideal time to revisit history. It’s the 10th anniversary of Tolentino’s company, Co.ERASGA, and Vancouver is entering its 125th year as a city. To celebrate, the four have revived and revamped Shadow Machine, which moves from its original location to the open, warehouselike space at W2 Storyeum, where it will run Wednesday (October 20) to October 23 and then October 27 to 30.

Still images of blueprints of ships and archival film footage of the logging industry are among the visuals that will be projected throughout the show. It’s all set to Gregory and Courtemanche’s computer-generated, rumbling score. The alternately soothing and assaulting soundscape features everything from the whoosh of steam engines to the clanking of metal tools. The two musicians will perform alongside five dancers: Billy Marchenski, Molly McDermott, Jane Osborne, Bevin Poole, and Tolentino himself.

“Peter and I use software we created to perform with,” Gregory explains. “It’s not just a tracking software that plays premade sound files. We have the ability to change things like pitch, reverb, echo, looping, choice of sounds, digital processing, and other things on the fly as part of the performance.”

The two also built instruments out of old toolboxes, using everything from electromagnetic coils to “one-string scrapyard guitars”.

For dance artist Tolentino, the work marks a shift in his development: his characteristic sinewy vocabulary here takes on a distinct mechanical tone.

“The choreography is all about the way our bodies react to machinery, to technology. How do you dance like a train? It’s very machine-y,” he says with a laugh.

More than a look at physical objects, however, Shadow Machine aims to celebrate the people behind the machinery, those who contributed so much to Vancouver’s growth in the past and those who continue to add to its character today.

“In essence, we’re honouring the workers,” Tolentino says. “And as artists, we’re always working. Even though it’s been precarious for the arts community [because of funding cuts], we’re in constant motion.”