Stages of soft
performance with paper, ink, measuring tape, graphite, word dice, guitar strings, custom harnesses, custom jewelry, music
*Documentation of pre-performance rehearsals
Performed at Rhizome DC in 2019
Stages of Soft is a study of storytelling, ritual, and the discreteness of our bodies. Performed at Rhizome DC over four days, Stages of Soft renders Hypostasis, a story of two archetypal mothers, as a series of rituals performed on a ten-foot paper diagram. Progressing through four concentric rings from the outside in, we move towards each other in stages of increasing intimacy, vulnerability, and entanglement, embodying the mothers’ journey. Beginning with measurement and chance operations and ending with physical embrace and storytelling, the gestures move from systematic abstraction in the outer ring toward vulnerability and entanglement in the nucleus.
Stages Of Soft Accordion Book
100 ft. long accordion book
2020
The SOS accordion book is both an artifact of the live performance of Stages of Soft and an abstracted translation of the original story it was based on, titled Hypostasis. It was made from the 10-foot paper map from the live iteration of the project. The book artifact references its original narrative form, yet retains the mystery of the mothers’ illusive and unorthodox methods. Evidence of their story remains, translated and re-translated into abstraction.
