Since 2011, glovers at more than a dozen universities across the country have found their community though Ambience, a club that promotes light shows as an art form.
Gloving is a twist on original rave light shows that contains forms of art, dance and entertainment.
“Think of it as dancing with your hands. We wear white gloves with LED lights on our fingertips and move our hands in patterns to the beat of the music,” founder and digital culture sophomore Marco Castillo said.
After searching for like-minded individuals, Castillo established Ambience at ASU this past semester.
Castillo said a negative connotation resides with gloving, and Ambience recognizes this issue.
“Gloving is more highly seen in the rave scene,” Castillo said. “We strive every day to separate ourselves from the stereotypes. We are connected to drug culture and it’s really irksome. We are trying to become our own thing.”
Toward the end of his high school education, Castillo’s friend introduced him to the art form.
“It was almost natural for me,” Castillo said. “I have a lot of excess energy and I’m always doing things like tapping pens, so I turned that into gloving movement. One day, he showed me a video of my now favorite glover, Blitzen, and I fell in love with the art form.”
While Ambience promotes gloving, Castillo made a personal decision to expand the club to other flow arts such as fire spinning and the most common form, poi, involving two small weights. However, gloving does take precedence in Arizona’s community.
As a tight-knit group, glovers recognize out-of-staters by their local style.
“There a lot of local styles,” Castillo said. “Ours is a lot of technicality and angles, while other states have more flow and circles. There are four main styles: flow, tech, conjuring and impacting.”
As a freshman four years ago, current interdisciplinary studies senior Sean Byrnes walked to class with headphones blasting electronic dance music and practicing new movements with his hands. However, Ambience had not reached ASU quite yet.
“I’m always on the lookout for other glovers on campus because I practice wherever I go and it's easy because your hands are always with you so you can do it whenever,” Byrnes said. “That’s how I met Marco and he found out about Ambience through me.”
In high school, Byrnes and his friends spun glow sticks on shoe strings after watching videos on Youtube. Eventually, they transitioned into gloving and began to appreciate electronic dance music.
"We were really into electronic dance music and the rest of our classmates weren’t,” Byrnes said. “Since college, I really hadn’t found other people who enjoy this kind of music, and now I’m meeting all of these people who accept it as a genre.”
As a current member of Ambience, he takes his skills to the public as the group performs occasionally at the Wasted Grain Bar in Scottsdale. In addition to this gig, events throughout Arizona offer a venue to them.
“There are a couple of us sponsored to go to a few festivals lately, from Wonderland in October to Global,” Byrnes said. “They paid for the tickets to the event and for us to give light shows for the company.”
While Castillo and Byrnes work on mastering the art of gloving, mechanical engineering sophomore and Secretary Rebecca Hunter prefers the art of poi. Hunter said she began spinning poi a year ago when she needed to fill a hole in her life left by graduating from high school.
“In high school, I spun riffles on the drill teams,” Hunter said. “So, I needed something to replace spinning the rifles, because rifles are not appropriate on campus. I started spinning poi as a way to keep my hands moving.”
Although she already spins poi and rifles, she picked up fire spinning in her free time. With fire extinguishers on hand, she said she finds satisfaction in the faces of her audience.
“I practice with objects that are not on fire,” Hunter said. “And, the clothing we wear, we make sure it’s all natural material, so if we do catch on fire, it burns instead of melts.”
Ambience at ASU meets at 7 p.m. on Fridays and introduces members to the gloving world through performances and trading techniques. Those who are interested in joining the club can reach out to Ambience at ASU's Facebook page.
Related Links:
‘Glovers’ and students dance in silence at MU After Dark’s Headphone Disco
Global Dance Festival showcases DJ talent, community of Arizona's rave scene
Reach the reporter at ncorr@asu.edu or follow @natalieorr19
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