This work is an interdisciplinary installation that focuses on the ways embodied storytelling can function as a historical care practice. This installation aids in the creation of a nonlinear archive based on the stories, memories, and lived experiences of Black folks in America.
Collaborators: Duke Dance Program, African & African American Studies
Cyclical Navigations: In the In Between conceptualizes storytelling as a practice of embodied memory recollection — one that aids in the navigation of cyclical temporalities in the present, or what I have termed the ‘In Between.’ The In Between is the space between and within history and the contemporary. It is the liminal space that exists between an Afropessimist reality and an Afrofuturist practice. This project considers what is possible if Black history and thus Black stories are treated with care through the valuing of Black bodies and voices, both living and deceased. This interdisciplinary installation takes the audience on a nonlinear journey of time through memory, story, movement, and location.
Movement Collaborators:
Alyah Baker, Jasmine Callis, Lee Edwards, Ayan Felix, Ama Gora, Juliet Irving & Aigner Picou
Lee Edwards (they/them/she) is an interdisciplinary movement artist and storyteller, whose primary modes of making are dance and poetry. Lee has performed with companies Lela Aisha Jones | FlyGround, Putty Dance Project, Dancespora, and Jo-Me’ Dance. Their writing has been featured in works by iKada Dance, Drye Marinaro Dance Company, and by artist Surya Swilley. Lee’s work Now or Then: Strange Fruit was part of the Wassaic Project’s All Out/All In exhibition. Their collaborative work mediating on safety and rest for Black Femmes in public space has been presented by ADF. Lee received their BFA in Dance from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia and is pursuing their MFA in Dance and a Graduate Certificate in African and African American Studies at Duke University in Durham, NC (expected 2022). Their work intermeshes speculations of the future, and navigation of liminal space between past and present through the centering of Black realities, stories, and experiences.