As we all gather for a festival of celebratory experience returning to the community, it is worth taking time to carve out a quiet space, a connecting meditative space for quieter contemplation within that celebration. There is value in offering a more balanced experience, a space for grieving and remembering if we need that, and the relative silence of simply being together.
These artists are collaborating to define a place of thoughtfulness as we move out of the pandemic / isolation and back, expressed through their diversity of backgrounds and eclecticism in mediums and genres — from dance to wearable sculpture to video sculpture. In a community, we have more opportunities for a careful, empathetic reconnection. This set of experiences seeks to hold such a space, an almost sacred environment, where art is at the center of this journey.
Kimberlee Koym-Murteira has used ritual, dance, and the expressive arts to externalize trauma metaphorically and now brings those practices to others with the project Unseen to Seen. Exploring art as a regenerative process and nature as a source of replenishment. How can we share both more in the community to create healing as a consistent life practice? Unseen to Seen: Dialogues on Healing is a collaboration between Kimberlee, Allison Pasquesi, Daniel Alexander Jones, and Sylvie Minot responding to the pandemic- an intense time of isolation- how do we now reconnect? Outcomes included community-sourced totems, illuminated liquid-filled jars, plaster body casts, wearable sculptures, and video imagery brought together to form a healing space / immersive installation with music by Laura Inserra.
Kimberlee’s contribution to the exhibit invites invited groups and the public to create body casts of their hands for a part of the project named Gestures Toward Touch. The casts embody a physical manifestation of reconnection. Hands classically are said to be one of the most expressive parts of our body. They are also responsible for so much of the activation/engagement of our lives. As we leave the circumstance of the pandemic the act of making these plaster cast in groups and transforming remnants of people’s bodies into fine art pieces to help bridge the many disruptions of the last few years.
Allison Pasquesi’s work approaches Unseen to Seen through wearable sculpture. She asks us to consider the relics of our trauma. What is left to us now? How can we come to see them as they are now and value them differently? Siting these elements on the body draws recognition of what we have borne.
Sylvie Minot dance practitioner guides the process as a mentor and practitioner of dance and the healing arts. She leads the organization Syzygy Dance Project which is a non-profit organization that transforms lives through dance. Syzygy offers mindful movement/dance classes to people facing challenging life circumstances, corporations in need of wellness classes, health organizations, and anyone looking to heal through dance.
Daniel’s approach to the theme of Unseen to Seen is to ask about the unseen forces informing and inviting your experience. Using the framework of the solar system, Daniel invites consideration of ancestors, life cycles, our relationship to the environment in which we live, and the universal symbols that mark it. A series of questions will guide you to consider what moves within you and who walks with you, unseen; and how you, seen, express these otherwise hidden truths.
