Bianca Mendonça

  LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten

Pathways & Crossroads

In this section, we are sharing insights into the context and artistic process of LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten.

Astrocaryum aculeatum, also known as tucumã-do-amazonas, is a palm tree native to the Amazon. Its long, tough leaves are used to make tucum, a high-quality fibre for making decorative objects such as mandalas, bags and baskets. The commercialisation of tucumã crafts is one of the main economic activities of the communities of Coroca, Tucumã, Urucumeá, São Marcos and many other villages located on the banks of the Amazon and the Arapiuns River. Connections between bodies and materials, landscape and crafts that weave through the ways of existence of people and tucumã palms are part of the identity of this region, whose roots lie in the culture of the indigenous peoples called Arapiuns.

This network of connections between body, culture and folk practices existing in this landscape translated to an artistic and contemporary experience was the starting point for the creation of the choreographic installation LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten.

The art craft made from the tucumã straw-threads represents more than just an artistic popular folk object: the tucumã craft is mostly braided and commercialized by women. Their work symbolizes a network of cultural, historical and feminist stories that tell a lot about processes of emancipation of women in these communities, about conservation and the relationship between the body and the landscape.

Through the sustainable use of the natural resources of the tucumã these traditional communities are able to survive economically. In this way, they protect themselves and this region of the Amazon from a process of uncontrolled exploitation that is gradually leading to their destruction and the disappearance of their original population. The commitment of these communities to the sustainable use of the tucumã is the main reason why this region is recognized as a natural reserve today. The creation of the choreographic-installation LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten was motivated by this context and by the idea of creating a space from a network of relations.

Creative Process

Embodying non-human Material

From the first day on, I brought a bag full of palha de tucumã to the rehearsals with the dancers. This material, or rather, the embodied relationship with the craft material was our starting point for the work in the studio. The initial idea was to use the palha to compose the space, using it as prop, costume and as scenographic element. At this time, we worked a lot in movement research that experimented with embodying the material qualities of the straw-fibre and with investigating how the close proximity with the material influenced our bodies. After a while of diving into abstract movements stemming from this embodiment of the palha qualities, we moved away from the idea to ‘investigate’ the original connections between the Arapiuns people and their craft material. At the same time, for organizational and financial reasons, we started working with raphia, which is another straw material very similar to palha. It originates from a palm tree found in Madgascar and East Africa and is used as material for weaving baskets, hats, mats and as string in agricultural and cultural contexts. Multi-colored types of raphia in varying strength became one of the co-movers in the studio as we used it to create human-non-human chimeric bodies.
With the figures, new identities, narrative companion with individual ways of being and moving entered our exploration. This Opened us up for investigating another layer of human-non-human-movement between the raphia and our bodies. When the focus shifted towards a physical exploration of the figures, the driving working question became what this relationship with the material could teach us as movers.
How can the process of embodying the organic material qualities of the raphia, and the narrative identities that formed together with the figures shape our performative being?

Embodying the connection between sound and body

The second starting point for the work in the studio were shakers. These are instruments made from organic materials like coconut shell and seeds. We used the shakers within our movement research similarly to the work of embodying the organicity of the raphia material – becoming and embodying the sounds of the shaker - and combined both raphia and instruments when we started creating the figures.
The shakers were brought to the project because composer I worked with for LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten, Bruna Cabral associated the sound of these instruments with this landscape of the Northern Amazon as much as I did. The sound they produce resonated with memories we shared in connection to the landscape of the Amazonian forest. Their soft murmur triggered memories, activated our senses and made us feel back the humidity of the forest touching our skin.
In a certain way we were also, unconsciously, making an association to indigenous practices, in which musical instruments like these are used to support rituals and cellebrations. Touching on the liminal and associative capacities of the instruments we used them to dive in this landscape of memories, movement and bodies.

Memories

Besides sharing the physical practice, we were also looking collectively at the Mappings, the video and photo documentation from the research phase of LandScaping 0.1 while sharing memories and affections connected with the region along the Arapiuns river. Almost all the artists involved in LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten shared a personal connection with the Amazon region. Some of them were connected to this place through their family background or have been there in the region in some occasion in the past.

Installation Format, Time and Space

In LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten time and space played a central role for the creation and for the result that was presented. For making the installation-environment of LandScaping 0.3 / Knoten, I collected Mappings of the landscape experiences I had made in my research in the Amazon in 2020. When moving from the rehearsal space into the church, we started layering different landscapes and time-relations.
The space was inhabited by installation objects that carried memories of the first two LandScaping projects, while the in the durational performative part a new landscape, neither part of the church setting nor a reinterpretation of the Amazonian landscape, was emerging out of moving bodies who were incorporating the connection of human body and organic material – raphia straw and shaker-instruments. Instead of interweaving the specific setting of the church with a recollection of the ‘original’ Amazonian landscape I had encountered, we developed a fleeting scenery made mostly from more-than-human figures and sound-bodies.
In this hybrid environment, audience members were invited to develop their own pathways through a space cartographed with texts. Not following the goal of a dance piece set on a stage with a centralized perspective, we wanted the audience to experience the work through different angles and to take decisions in relation to how long they wanted to stay with the different layers of the work.

Working on this format – a choreographic installation in combination with a durational performance – we searched, as performers, for a performative state that would allow us to work with the extended length of each material. How to find strategies for the performers to keep the energy, during the whole performance while being in a continuous state of research and improvisation?
At the same time, we worked on finding a balance between the performative specifictiy of each movement material and an installation performance-quality with which these materials can transform while they are put in space. Although the choreographic score was settled beforehand, we were looking for a creative state that would help us to “create in the oment”.

How to position yourself as performer in relation to the performative material in the context of an installation ? How to build a connection with the space I move in that feeds back into my movement?