Dance, performance… You choose your body as a medium to express yourself…. When did you realize that art is your path?

I think I knew that from the time that I was a very young child, but I’m also always trying to discover my path with greater specificity. I have deeply questioned if what I am doing in the world has purpose in the face of major global challenges. But the fact that I care that so many people are hungry, that the environment has experienced such devastation, that human conflict can destroy the beauty in and around us—that care that I am inspired to have makes me want to create art and bring beauty, compassion, and imagination into the world.

 

How do you balance your various projects since you are both an artist and a professor ?

Great question! I don’t know that I have achieved my ideal balance because it is still easier for me to give all of my time to things that other people need rather than my own artistic work. In some ways those two aspects of my work support each other, while in other ways, I continue to learn how to make space for being filled and fulfilled as an artist so that I can give to students.

 

Could you tell us about the process of creations? How long does it take to move from an idea to a performance?

Each project is different, but I like to spend a significant amount of time in quiet and even stillness to make space for ideas and movement to arrive. I like to take a year or two for longer-term projects to fully develop, but I usually work on other smaller projects during that same time which may have a creative process lasting only a few weeks.

 

What are some of your favorite projects you are proud to have been a part of in your career?

One of the projects that has had the biggest impact on me is a dance film I made a few years ago after the attack on the maternity ward in Kabul. In that work, I invited some other women artists from different places in the world to join me in a shared gesture of remembrance for the women and children who were killed that day. Although my artistic work may not solve the difficult problems of the world, this project helped me realize how important it is to create space for honoring and remembering people, especially in fast-paced cultures and global news cycles.

 

To what extent does the pandemic influence your depiction of art? Does it generate new inspiration?  

The pandemic has inspired me to collaborate with other artists in virtual ways. Although this is not the same as working together in person, beautiful ideas and openness to experimentation have come out of the constraint.

 

How do you feel about being involved in an online residency program? How important is it to stay connected with the international art community?

I have been pleasantly surprised by how enlivening this online residency is. From the first meeting, I began to feel inspired by hearing about other artists’ work and supported by the residency staff to stretch my own practices as well as to receive help in connecting with more artists.

What are your thoughts about the theme ‘artist on standby’? Tell us a bit more about your project…

I am inviting women artists from around the world to join me in a project as part of the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence created by the Center for Women’s Global Leadership and UN Women. This project intends to raise more awareness about gender-based violence (which has increased during the pandemic) as well as to allow the artists involved to contribute their performance work to an important effort as global citizens. The entire project will be featured on Instagram and can be shared to help spread the information and advocacy effort. This project considers an aspect of “artists on Standby” that promotes “standing by” as an act of witnessing, support, and advocacy.

 

What do you want to achieve before things return to normal if it is to happen? Any future plans/projects?

I hope to learn the lessons this whole experience is inviting us to understand—particularly about our interconnectedness with each other and the environment. I am developing a new series of work entitled The Watchful which interweaves 4 distinct-yet-connected dance solos exploring kinesthetic empathy between women’s bodies and bodies of water. As a live performance work that moves audiences from a waterfront site into a theatre, the project considers environmental devastation impacting both women’s bodies and bodies of water in 4 global locations. The process of creating the solos includes outreach components to women’s centers in those locations including Armenia, Morocco, Ireland, and Mississippi. Through these outreach efforts, the work will integrate perspectives of women from around the world into the performance as well as hopefully create radical friendships between women who care about issues impacting their local rivers, lakes, and oceans. The project acknowledges the current environmental devastation occurring to human bodies and bodies of water while using artwork to imagine the positive potentials for healing both.