Beatrice Jarvis: Ecological costume making

( Amergin in Magan. M ( 2020) Thirty Two words for Field. Gill Books. Dublin P11)

A gentle inquiry into somatic ecological costume making; inviting participants to explore the heart of North Woods as an extension of self through a series of 4 co-crafted movement scores leading to co-curated micro performances.

This workshop will begin with a studio-based warm-up; exploring guided meditation; somatic touch and Ujjayi Pranayama breath work; seeking to allow the body to commence our explorations as a curious open vessel for encounters. Questioning the space between self and land, mud and skin, breath and air; a duet begins; entwining forms. We will be working with scores inspired by Joanna Macy, World as Lover, World as Self; exploring through guided walking and somatic movement practices, concepts such as ‘the wheel of interbeing’, and ‘the greening of the self’.

Participants will be invited to edit and co-create the scores which will then lead a paired walk to North Woods. Collecting en route; physical materials and ephemeral sensations, in a delicate and ecologically sensitive way; we will explore the terms; container, vessel and the concept of the porous; questioning as we move;

Will the outcome reflect the landscape in which the body is submerged as a stimulus for the process; or will the product, which emerges, become a personal narrative?

Pausing, reflecting, and refining; we adorn; creating simple immersions into the paths taken; connecting with other, with self; to create a trio; with self; other; land and the spaces between. Each participant will be equipped with a simple sustainable and recycled circular body frame which they can use as a base layer for their ecological costume making. These frames form both live costumes for our embodied somatic reflections during the workshop and also form unique temporary sculptural objects which form a dialog reflective of our experience of place.

This workshop offers insight into performance making as an ecologically sustainable process; inviting participants to question how both costume making, performance process making, and social reflection can function as tools to actively reflect upon notions of the post-human, and the transformative capacity of performance. Conceptually; the workshop is designed to be experienced in pairs; ideally with someone you have never met; in order to best facilitate a mutual inquiry as to the social function of a duet in performance practice to become a mode of socio-ecological inquiry. The scores provided will offer prompts for the foundations opening this duet into a land-based trio.

Documentation of this performance-making process is sensitive and highly attuned to the needs of the participant. There will be an optional sharing of collective practices on the following day; either as performance or discussion; in North Woods. This workshop draws from the planetary work of Anna Halprin; Kate Fitzpatrick ( Macha’s Twins); Donna J Harraway (Staying with the Trouble) questioning through embodied ecological collective practice; concepts such as sympoiesis ( making with) to question how choreographic practices can become a tool for environmental awareness. This research methodology retains a core ethos of developing the art of reflecting upon how we see the world; what enables us to form specific routines, habits and engagements; and how subtle shifts of focus and awareness can enable these to become more sensitive and attuned to the world in which we live.