Choreographic Architecture and Vital Knowledge

Abstract

This article places a performance called Meanwhile by Gaëtan Rusquet in conversation with theories of New Materialism and Indigenous epistemologies to analyse how these events contribute to ecological awareness. Each performance of Meanwhile is variable and foregrounds human imbrications in environments, rather than human domination or control of environs. As a result, the project intervenes in discourses of climate change denial that dissociate human actions from natural disasters. Ultimately this article argues that the sensory knowledge generated through Meanwhile, and the Indigenous worldviews that the performance makes evident, call for more nuanced methodologies for performance analysis.

While there are multiple articles that examine climate change in books, academic journals and newspapers, performances of Meanwhile suggest that lived experiences have the ability to challenge familiar ways of behaving and consuming, and motivate audiences to reconsider political and economic decisions. More specifically, this article attends to the ways Meanwhile makes visible interdependencies among environments, materials, and humans, and how our actions contribute to climate change. While theories of New Materialism are valuable frameworks for understanding interdependencies, ultimately this article argues that they often replicate Indigenous worldviews, and that it is vital to honour Indigenous perspectives in performance studies and performance analysis to avoid the occlusion and erasure of these long–standing and relevant value systems.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This research has been supported by a Faculty Scholarly Grant from the University of Utah.