What are we doing?
/I am filed with wonder.
I am finding something inside of myself that I did not know was there.
No.
That isn’t true.
I have known it was there, for a long time.
But I thought it would be better if I kept it hidden.
My work with Andrew has given me permission to be exactly who I am, and to bring the part of myself I was hiding, out into the open.
I am different because of this.
As a human being, and as an artist.
I see and experience the world from a new perspective.
I am giving myself permission to follow my imagination with trust, curiosity, respect, and dignity.
A student asked me the other day, “What are we doing? I don’t understand. I feel lost.”
Which was funny, because I had asked Andrew the same thing a few days before, in almost exactly the same words.
Because of the work I am doing with Andrew right now Because of the way I am teaching my classes Because of what I am learning from my students in those classes, every single day Because of my own inquiry into creative process and dance making Because of an urgent desire to bring this work out into the world,
in my very humble opinion, in our tiny little corner of the universe, this is how I understand and distill what we are doing:
We are taking a deep dive into the depths of creative inquiry. We are asking questions. We are wondering. We are excavating what is necessary, urgent, and relevant in each moment. We are working, researching, and pondering the current climate of where dance is now: What are the restrictions of dance? How do we push up against them? How do we move forward into this next phase dancing, artistic expression, and creative inquiry? We are listening.
“As artists, we create worlds. And at the same time, the world creates us. We are gently pushing civilization forward,” Said Andrew when it was my turn to feel lost and when it was my turn to ask what were we doing.
We are on the edge of moving this art form forward, along with so many others who are doing the same thing, in their own way, and in their own geographic location.
This edge -- it is quiet, small, and almost invisible.
But it is there, and it is vibrating, and we are sharing ourselves and our vulnerability through the innate desire for expression, as we search for and seek out what is true.
As we search for and seek out what is changing and shifting within us and outside of us.
We dance for ourselves, we dance for each other, and we dance for something that is bigger than that.
We dance to find out what is underneath that which is known.
We dance to reveal what cannot be spoken.
We dance because we are beginners in this inquiry into creative expression.
The more we know, the less we understand.
So we start from the very beginning, every single time.
With whatever fears, anxieties, hurts, questions, and curiosities we carry, we always start from the beginning.
The beginning is the breath.
The beginning is the body.
The beginning is waiting to see what sort of dance one will step into, in a particular moment in time.
The beginning is the gathering that takes place among those who are asking these same sorts of questions.
The beginning is the gathering that takes place among those who are willing to follow what arises in the dance when we are together.
The beginning is the gathering that takes place where each and every one of us has the opportunity — always — to step into the dance that is already in the room.
If you would like to join me for this type of gathering — the type of gathering where we follow our imagination with trust and curiosity, respect and dignity, click here to learn more about the sort of dance opportunities I will be offering this summer.
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With Warmth and Jivey Vibes, Joanna of Joanna and The Agitators sweetly agitating/persistently upending www.joannaandtheagitators.com