Performing Diaspora

the days are much longer here. we wake up early. we sleep early and into the night. we dream wild dreams that feel too real but ought not to be. or else. or at least that is the summary of what occurs therein. it's good to hear mom's boisterous laugh. it breaks to hear her cry for her mother. my grandmother. in my dreams i wonder why i do not see her. mom talks about me so much - too much. but such is the homecoming, such is the elongated time of being without

By Erica Dixon   I met with our 2016 Performing Diaspora artists to chat about their process two weeks ago, the week before our recent election. After last week's reaffirmation of our country's divisiveness and bigotry, the exploration of the artist's role in activist work feels more important now than ever. A question that I have been perpetually interested in, in CounterPulse's work, the work of our artists, and my own artistic endeavours, is why we choose art as our medium

The Performing Diaspora residency at CounterPulse returned this year with two works mapping the connection between ancestry, queer identity, and tradition asking, ‘How do we collaborate with the force of the unseen? How we can transcend the toxins flowing in our bodies and societies?’ The residency creates a platform for artists of color to tell their own stories across time, without boundaries or borders. This years artists included Mother the Verb, a collective of three femmes, Javier Stell-Fresquez, Davia Spain,