'To the voice that doesn't use words listen' exclaimed Laurence Durrell, for all landscapes say, 'I am watching you, are... Read More
'To the voice that doesn't use words listen' exclaimed Laurence Durrell, for all landscapes say, 'I am watching you, are you watching yourself in me?'
Contemporary enquiry into the 'disconnection' between 'us' and 'nature' alludes only to our misconceptions through the structures we have built. We are nature, separateness is an illusion.
With this knowledge, I trace my inner topography into the earth in a meditative trance and time expands. We are of cosmic and earthen matter, in life and in death, we are one being.
During the 2018 performance the audience was invited to participate in this ritual meditation via an offering of edible earth and drinkable mud. The words offered to the receiver were 'this is you, this is us'. The piece was accompanied by an installation of mud, dripping throughout the performance onto a white canvas. The percussion of earth on skin, the last rain, at our final breath, a celebration of our reunion with earth; and a voiceover invoking the audience to query their own relationship with earthen matter breaks the silence at long intervals.
The scent of raw vetiver roots were passed for people to smell. Vetiver roots have a powerful role in cultivation, binding the soil together. Prior to the performance the space was smoked with Oud, Frankincense and Myrrh inducing the same ancient euphoric states that one encounters in places of ritual. Only nature's materials have language to transport and shift our perceptions of how we belong in the universe.
This performance is a tranquil and interactive piece, a space held for reflection over our innate and miraculous nature, in life and in death.
*There is no film footage of the performance
