re-creating the hammam
becoming. fluid. eros. origin stories. new mythologies.
Dear Dearborn,
How fast the half-way point of my residency has arrived. The time has felt deep and rich. Nourishing and revealing.
I would like to extend an invitation for the final event of my residency to all the women who have participated in the becoming-Fluid workshops, AND this invitation is extended to a woman in your life who has not participated but you would like to invite to share this journey with, to join me in re-creating aspects of the hammam through performance ritual on Sunday June 11th from 11am-1:30pm.
Ephemeral shadows of the hammam will be present through video and audio I recorded through creative rituals with women and female refugees from the SWANA inside ancient hammams in Northern Greece this past year. Resonating, breathing and moving in relation to their energy, I will facilitate participants in Dearborn through creative collaborations with water, finding fluidity in the body and voice. The event will culminate in a meditative story-telling ritual re-imagining the origins of eros and honoring women who have taught us lessons in love in order to write new mythologies of collective care.
Together through exchange, creative collaboration and attunement, we will bring to life a fluid space to counter narratives of division. Connecting through body and voice with our sisters overseas and relics of the past, participants will be invited to collectively imagine a future without shame that honors female sexual energy as a restorative healing force ecologically, politically and personally.
Artifacts of our performance ritual as a living archive of love will migrate back overseas with me to the women in refugee camps and female circles I work with there to respond to, attune with, develop on and integrate into their own rituals of collective care together inside the hammams.
Aspects of this bi-national research and evolving archive of love are informing the development of a new dance performance I am creating through support from National Performance Network’s Creation Fund.
If you have not had a chance to participate yet, there is one more workshop 11-1:30pm on Sunday June 4th at the Museum. AND I am recording interviews with women living in Dearborn. If you are interested to talking to me about your experiences of being woman and relationship to water I’d love to meet you! To schedule an interview please get in touch with me through the museum!