What Falls Beneath the Surface

What Falls Beneath the Surface is an installation and on going practice that researches the cycles of life and death through freediving dance, aquatic therapy, somatic practices, and film. In this live installation we are sharing a collection from the origins of our meeting the power of the waters, driven by questions such as: How do we metabolize grief? What are the resources of regeneration that live in the deep? How does restricting the breath catalyze transformation? How do we make a rituals from confronting and alchemizing the fears that erupt from our bodies?

This installation was projected floating overhead above an outside warm pool at Three Sisters Kuanyin Sanctuary in Fruitvale, Oakland. Audience members chose hourly time slot in the evening of December 16 and 17th and floated in a 96° salt-water warm pool while experiencing the installation.

This installation premiered on a boat at Hošek Contemporary in Berlin, Germany in September 2022.

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The seed for this project was sprouted from deep within the lockdowns of the pandemic, where we were collectively confronting the psychological, social, political, existential (etc) impacts of restricting and fearing the flow of breath. It sprouted from a time where we were intimately facing the grief of death within our families and communities. It sprouted from a time where many could not bare the conditions of their life and chose to leave this realm. It sprouted from a time of pervasive disorientation, uncertainty, and fear. Given this, for us, this project was a deeply personal investigation in how to face the reality of death, how to find a genuine willingness to be here, how to develop embodiment within disorienting landscapes, and how to extract vitality from our own ambivalence.

In this underwater journey, we dive into unknown depths where we are seduced by a liminal world, and where the pressure of potential overwhelm demands our immediate presence. It is here, where we begin to learn how to molt and dance with the fears that live beneath the surface. It is here where we begin to understand how surfacing from the depths, again and again, strengthens our connection to life, each other, and our collective experience.

This collection is a series of videos and poetic field notes written, danced, and recored in the waters of Cenote Azul & Bacalar in Quintano Roo, Mexico, and northwestern Sicily. The work has no beginning and no ending, everything is curved, and the desire for catharsis fades into a practice that recycles itself. ________________________________________________________________________

Thank you to Javier Sintolo & Gabriel Forestini for your cinematic eye/filming
& Thank you to Peekaboo for bringing your cello sounds to our underwater world.