In the post Bruising for Besos Q&A Adelina Anthony said that “we’re always trying to tell the same story… hopefully each iteration gets better as we discover the nuances.” The “same story” we attempt to tell is not only our own, but that of our familial and community histories and their definitive impact on our lives. Anthony said our art tells the stories of our mothers, and our mothers’ mothers, and so on. We do not exist without influence. Anthony’s remarks speak realities of familial/cultural inheritance and, in some cases, trauma that when coupled with societal forces acting on people living life on the margins (especially in environments that do not recognize the lasting effects of these inheritances), manifest in our everyday interactions and relationships.
Anthony's work is an expression of our ability to take agency over those influences through art and memory work. Bruising for Besos' central character, Yoli, was an artist who used puppetry to cope with the traumas of her past. As the puppet master Yoli literally took agency over the members of her family and herself represented by puppets in the retelling of her story. As Anthony said, memory is a work of the imagination, and people re-member past experiences as necessary to constitute certain presents (and futures); yet in Yoli's memorywork there was a fixation. Yoli was stuck in her past and even her agency over it did not allow her to re-member it in a way that would make room for healing in her present and future. At the end of Bruising for Besos we see Yoli embarking on a journey to reencounter that past in a manner that may lead to closure and breakthrough.
In the Collective Breathing workshop Adelina we practiced the embodiment of our agency over memory. In one exercise, the group conjured the most fierce individual in our lives. Anthony asked not only to picture them, but to bring them into the room by mirroring their fierce body language. We then voiced one of their popular sayings, attempting to mimic their tone. Anthony explained that the process of embodying another is not devoid of effect, the way that people hold their bodies and speak carries a specific energy and memory. For example if a person is constantly weighed down by life's emotional and mental burdens, they may begin to carry that weight in their shoulders. The way the body is held determines what will come from it, therefore as performers we must be connected to our bodies; aware of our own natural energy and of the energy that a character/scene requires. Understanding our own bodies, the experiences that have molded them and the energy we carry on a regular basis allows us to remained centered in our performative practice. When we know what energy is not ours, we can let it go when we no longer need it, yet we have to have an identifiable space to come back to. When Adelina asked us to find our neutral space, in body and breath, it was a time that required intimate awareness of that which I often take for granted. I have to come to know my body so that I can return to it when circumstances, given or pursued, cause me to separate from it, taken refuge or causing harm in my head.
The process of channeling energy seems solitary, yet because there was the opportunity to share and see others move from themselves into their various characters, as well as be seen, community was formed. Adelina's work caused me to think of how, in the multiple iterations involved in our continuous pursuit of the single story, we can involve others in the process. As someone who has rarely written fiction, every story that I tell has a direct link to something I have experienced. With this, I am often worried about telling the story "correctly" and feel guilty when I say things different from how they happened either because I cannot remember or to create greater impact. In the second exercise of the workshop Adelina asked us to share with a partner the story of the first time we lied. Already that was a challenge because I've told so many small lies in my life that I couldn't pinpoint the first one. My story ended up being a lie I told at 14 to my mother about my nose piercing. It was certainly not the first lie I'd told but it came out for a reason. I had to ask myself what is the meaning behind this story,why is this the lie that stuck out in your mind as major/representative of a turning point? Through my telling of the story I gained insight into what I considered important/memorable. Now I can see that it is more important in my storytelling to determine why a story matters to me and what I am trying to convey than to ask if it is "the truth" (in an objective sense). The truth comes when I am able to deliver the message I mean to deliver in a manner that I am satisfied with. In the second part of the exercise, our partner had to retell our story as they remembered it, taking on our character (body language, voice, etc). Seeing myself reenacted by someone else allowed me to further let go of the focus on getting it exactly right, because what is right is merely up to our interpretation anyway, and allow the piece/performance/story to be what we need it to be, whether a replica of the source of inspiration or not. It was beautiful to see that my life and thoughts could be the inspiration for someone else's work. In that moment a community formed, with me as the foundation, and went on to be more than it could have been if it was limited to my precise collection of the experience performed by me.
The work of collective creating is understanding how we bring others into the process of telling this ongoing/recurring story with respect for our individual intentions and corporate satisfaction. This is beautifully demonstrated throughout Tragic Bitches as a line from one of the writers poems is used as the section title under the influence of which all the writers write. For example
Welcome.
There are few living platforms at Colgate that bring people together to find voice and speak life from the margins. This limits our individual and collective abilities, as members of the Colgate community, to understand how each other’s struggles, passions, and the expression of these struggles and passions, are inherently linked to others, and instrumental in shaping our entire lives. Collective Breathing (learn more here) is a space where unheard contemporary voices from the Colgate community engage in a collaborative process of breathing life into our stories for ourselves and the wider Colgate community.
As a member of Collective Breathing I, Sharon Nicol, designed a companion independent study entitled Collective Breathing: The Making and Memory of a Feminist Art/Performance Collective. This blog is the home of my work in the course and an archive of my experiences within the collective.
The Collective Breathing course is centered around three major themes—Shaping(Making), Telling(Living), Remembering(Archiving). These themes exist as a framework for the present collective and future generations. Shaping the Collective Breathing project involves developing the vision for the current collective, understanding who is part of the vision, and determining how the vision will be realized. Telling the project means executing the vision, whether it be a communal creative space and/or an end-of-semester performance. Telling is not only about the end-product, but all that exists between. Remembering the project focuses on how a project’s herstory is preserved for those involved and future generations. Remembering is in conversation with content and medium, asking what do participants want to be remembered and how? These processes can occur simultaneously, at varying lengths, out of order, and sometimes not at all, yet having engaged with other models that uptake such a structure and in recording the collective’s experiences with these themes as they happen, we will be better able to return to order/the vision if there are any missteps during the process, and better contextualize our outcomes post-vision. Through this blog, I will document my reflections as I move through the Collective Breathing syllabus (which can be viewed here, along with the independent study proposal)
This is my attempt at remaining accountable and transparent with my own thoughts and further humanizing the process myself and fellow collective breathers are engaged in, for generations to come. I am imperfect, and I recognize the value of sharing the imperfections of the building process in order to sustain this work.
I welcome feedback and hope that you will stay engaged throughout our journey. Please visit the larger Collective Breathing Blog/Archive that will feature voices of the whole group.
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