Start where you are.
Sense the surface and topography of your flesh.
Notice the dimension of its contours and altitudes in every location.
Gently move into the numerous curves of your elevations.
Drop deeper now beneath the surface into volume and depth,
Sensing the history of its geology —the textures of its structure and substance.
Allow your movement to map the many pieces of its whole.
Notice the Celsius/Fahrenheit above and below the surface.
Begin to layer this with circles in the astronomy of your joints.
Visit the unfamiliar places within their orbital galaxies.
As you enter into zero gravity, begin to move with plenty of time.
Move with curiosity and mystery but not with knowing.
Listen to the rivers that run through the whole of your body.
Find the direction of its fluid highways and reach to discover its source.
Allow your movement to flow as if the rivers are moving you.
Increase the volume of their channels to carve your shape and form.
Allow the rivers to float you towards your oceanic origins.
Drop all effort as you receive the currents, waves, and fluctuations.
Sense the wave rhythms of your bones and organs floating inside you.
Let go and float as you are carried by overlapping tides.
Drop even deeper now into the molecules of your body.
Go to the innermost center of your being and activate a small quake.
Let its vibration travel from your atoms to your edges.
Allow it to grow until it echoes into the canyons of your breath.
Let it grow into wildness.
Let it remove weight from your structure.
Dissolve the density of your matter
Until the distance between laughter and tears is diminished.
Drop all effort now. Become light like a bird but not like a feather.
Feel the clarity of your course.
Thin the powder-fine dust between purpose and desire.
Extract the possibilities of vast horizons encompassing all directions.
Invite the sensation of weightless amusement.
Cherish without loss.
Elevate to fortify the strength of your form.
Feel your senses growing astute and agile.
Allow everything to exist or be possible.
Sense time as a form of wealth with detachment.
Drop all other aims than to shed impatience.
Imagine your movement as light and your body as airborne.
Fly according to distance but not ground.
Sense your swiftness and mobility as bearers of meaning.
Allow your movement to settle into the rhythm of your being.
Savor the indefinite spark that shoots out from the edge of its expression.
Feel the freedom inside your structure as an emblem of the present forking out into future.
Sense the gentleness of your imagination guiding you over converging soils.
Ride on the flux of sensations into consciousness, but not catharsis; existence, but not the void.
Land within the geometry of a soul made flesh, only hidden by its surface.
Write down a list of locations you love, places you still want to visit, acts of kindness you’ve witnessed, questions you harbor about home, a recipe for a vegetable you hate, the address of your closest community garden, library, or body of water.
EAT GARLIC. GO TO ELEMENTARY SCHOOL. ATTEND A COUNTRY MUSIC FESTIVAL. SEE A POP STAR SING. GO TO THE MOVIES. TEACH CREATIVE WRITING. PLAY LOUD MUSIC ON CAR SPEAKERS BUT BE BLACK. ATTEND MIDDLE SCHOOL.
In my process as a choreographer, usually the image comes first: a spinning white plate, an underwater queen, a weeping bounce house, spaghetti hair. When constructing and deconstructing that image in the studio, I practice a sort of radical presence encompassing my body, my spirit, and the image. I aim at breaking open the symbolism in a way that might reveal something about the human condition. That research recycles back into my body and distills into a kernel of physical information that I use as a psychic barometer to navigate a more lengthy research period. The more time I have in this state, the more I am able to articulate tasks that I feel will guide the dancers toward surrender.
The photographs and notes shown here document this process through three works: Tropical Depression, a work in progress set to premiere in May 2019 at Miami Dade Live Arts; Carne Viva, first shown at the American Dance Festival (ADF) in 2016; and Make Believe, first shown at ADF in 2018.