In 2013 I collaborated with Izabella Finch, a dancer, singer, comedian and performance artist. With a shared interest in the earth and driven by environmental and political unrest, we embarked on an investigation of soil and water. Using dance, drawing, painting, theatre, sensual and somatic movement enquiries we investigated how we relate to these materials and each other. Following two residencies at The Owl Barn in the Cotswolds and Exeter Northcott Theatre we created a performance called Mud, revealing something of our earthly nature.
This is where it begins. The peas and beans have gone in and it is now, this very vaginal time. Man and woman take both responsibility to move her. They turn her over, some wearing gloves, some handling her with their naked hands. They twist and turn her, pulling at the old scraps and rotten roots which overtime she has clasped tight, a hard grip, frozen with the winters bite. It is not easy for her to let loose. She tries to hold her lumps but as man and woman wriggle in, manipulating gently, together they find a way, an ease. Given devotion she is able to relax fully loosening her hold on the weeds she had grown and become. Slowly she spreads out. Her fertile qualities open and ready for new seeds to be planted.
More than Mud...
In 2021 Izabella and I were awarded an Ivor Research Grant from the Society for Dance Research, to make durational experiments involving time spent with organic matter including trees, soil and water and alternatively with screen-technology. Through these performative explorations we aim to cultivate awareness and discussion of how we are becoming with these more than-human influences. http://societyfordanceresearch.org/wp/ivor-guest-research-grants-2021/
