Screenshot from "Borderlessbodies, Transsoils" by Río Saúl
Shift into Queer Time
By Aiano Nakagawa
Today's writing explores the 2nd Annual Queering Dance Festival, presented by Shawl-Anderson Dance Center in Berkeley, California. The 2020 iteration took place on September 19 and 20, 2020 on Twitch, with both live and pre-recorded pieces. Nakagawa reflects on the September 19th performance.
I think we can agree: we are not living in “normal times.” In the midst of this global pandemic, civil uprising in response to hundreds of years of a white supremacist reign, and our collective’s response to the growing powers of a fascist regime, I have been questioning, “What is normal?” Realizing that I have no desire for a return to “normal,” as defined by the old world ruled by wealthy, cishet, white men. But we’ve already transitioned into the new world order, and that begs the question: What do I want to bring with me from the old world? What still holds true?
As I cozied up in my partner’s bed, ready to tune in to the Queering Dance Festival, I was met with some sadness around not being at an in-person venue, able to embrace my community with soft arms and a big smile. In the same breath, I was excited and curious about what possibilities and new realities would emerge within the creative confines of an online dance festival. One such possibility I noticed right away, was that unlike in years past, people from all over the world were able to tune in and witness these Queer artists sharing their creations in all their strength, power, and uniqueness.
As the program began, I was reminded of the questions I have been asking myself through this period of quarantine and keeping physical distance. “What do I want to bring with me from the old world? What still holds true?” At the center of my musings has been time, but not as we’ve known it before. I’m talking a slow, sensual, expansive time - outside of the 9-5, 40/hour workweek grind so many of us had become accustomed to. This sense of expansive time was illustrated by each artist, helping me feel less alone in my own mind.
In "The Living Database," Zoe Huey and Nicole Maimon investigated the nature of relationships across time and space - what and how do we build intimacy between people, when our physical bodies are not together? This is something I’ve been thinking lots about. In the creation of their tender and sweet archives to one another, they demonstrate the practice of listening to time within the body, of indulging in the pleasure of stillness, and trusting that they are in the process of creating something together.
"Borderlessbodies, Transsoils" begins as Río Saúl walks in a circle, pouring dirt from the Earth in what feels like a ceremonial sacred way. Invoking memories of their grandfather, calling to ancestral notions of time that span beyond our present bodies in all directions. Reminding me of the vast history (hidden and celebrated) of the Queer people who have existed in urban and rural spaces, out in the open or solely in their hearts. Their work begged me to reflect on the relationship between time, body, land, and ancestors - all inextricably linked, yet understood by so many as separate entities.
Screenshot from "LaPlegaria" by JanpiStar
JanpiStar invited us into their world within a small space - very intimate, warm. Their piece, "LaPlegaria," played with time as movement in deep relation to the space around them. They move seamlessly from their chair to the floor, upside down and all around. Out of vision from the camera, shadows moved against the wall, leaving only a chair in view, initiating my hunger to know, what’s behind the fourth wall? I am still so curious to know.
Lucia August’s piece, "All I Know," transports us from JanpiStar’s small, little world into an open studio filled with bright light. Her big body walking backward on a path, moving through space and possibly through time. She asks, “Why do we torment ourselves to continuously move forward?” Her pace picks up as she asks her next question, “What happens if we stop?” She fidgets with an invisible doorknob as she recalls her coming out 45 years ago. With her, we travel back in time to a moment when “Queer” was a bad word. She states clearly and firmly, “I absolutely love her. That’s really all I know.” Those words feel important to acknowledge at any point in time, this sentiment of absolute love and it, at times, being all we really know.
We end with randy reyes’ piece "un retablo on rupture & liberation" in a bright industrial studio in Lisbon, Portugal. Their movement offers a sense of edging towards one’s desires incrementally while exploring what is uncovered as we burrow underground. A techno track is laid against their slow, almost still body, enticing my own body to catch the beat. Suddenly I am moving. I am dancing to this beat as randy’s body moves slowly like molasses. In a moment of confrontation, randy comes face-to-face with the camera and sticks out their tongue, blowing us kisses. I just want to squeeze their face and kiss them back, like we are rolling together at a rave in some far off galaxy sweating, moving, and letting the music fill our bodies. The piece ends back in the natural world, back on earth with a soundscape of water and birds. randee’s body continuing to move to the big beats of moments passed - bouncing joyously as if we are still in the other galaxy.
While each piece was created separately, they were brought together through the theme of time. To study the construct of time as we know it, to recognize its origins within white supremacist capitalist systems, to break it apart, and reconstruct in ways that are supportive and life-affirming, rooted in our bodies and the earth - that is not just within the realm of the work and expertise of the dancer but as a Queer person. For many of us, our lives end and begin again, we fall in love on different timescales, we don’t follow the narrow constructions that time has confined us within. We are always playing with time, knowing that in the end/beginning, all will be tied back together.
Aiano Nakagawa (they/she) is a big-bodied, Queer femme dancer, writer, educator, and life-long learner based in Oakland, CA, and Portland, OR. Their work centers the body as an integral component and site of liberation. They support people on their journey towards living an embodied life with a deep connection to their innate wisdom, power, and pleasure potential. aianonakagawa.com
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