Oceanic Unknowing: Darkening and dirtying artistic research in Aotearoa NZ

Dr. Alys Longley, University of Auckland, NZ  with choreographic dramaturgy by Tru Paraha

In Aotearoa NZ, decolonising practice-led-research can question settler/colonial paradigms of proprietorial ownership, extractive economy and individualist brilliance for alternative flows of collaborative knowing, dark encounter, community-led forms of care and activism, and the ignition of relational potentialities.  This talk discusses the work of artist-researchers such as Rebecca Hobbs and Tru Paraha, whose work draws on transcultural poetics, performance writing, site-situated practice, cultural activism and post-human attention that is moved by the vitality of dirt, matter and black-out states.

Longley Bio

Dr Alys Longley is an interdisciplinary performance maker, teacher and writer. Her interests span artistic research, performance writing, interdisciplinary projects, art and ecology and narrative research.  Her work has been performed in NZ, Australia, Germany, Austria, UK, Chile, and Portugal. Alys's books The Foreign Language of Motion (2014) and Radio Strainer (2016) are published by Winchester University Press (UK). She is the creator of Smudge Skittle: A Little Inventory of Resources Entangling Creative Practice Research and Writing (2018) and co-editor of the books Artistic Approaches to Cultural Mapping; Activating Imaginaries and Means of Knowing (Routledge, 2018) and Undisciplining Dance (Cambridge Scholars Press, 2018). Alys is a Senior Lecturer in the Dance Studies Programme, University of Auckland, New Zealand.