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by Veroneque Ignace, Founding Artistic Director of Kriyol Dance! Collective.
Building scholarship around Vodou and it’s practice is a beautiful thing. To uplift the philosophies that inherently exist in afro-indigenous practice — through the same academic industries that have raised prestige from dismantling those very philosophies — is just dope. It should always happen. Because black and indigenous folk been woke and everyone should know it. But, even as I write those words something about all this has always concerned me. In the past two years, I have had the opportunity to meet brilliant actors — writers, teachers, artists, activists, and Vodouyizan alike — who have all supported the idea that remnants of Catholicism in Vodou practice today are purely the result of colonization. They’ve supported the idea that access to scholarly writing and convening about Vodou is somehow the same as access to life-long sacred practice and communities. They go as far as to feature ritual practice in spaces that are devoid of any spiritual root or connection - academic conferences, predominantly white institutions, museums...
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About 5 years ago I experienced what I now understand as the inception of a spiritual awakening. I knew then that I had found tools to create peace in all of the darkness that was threatening to consume me, but I did not know that this path would also give me the keys to liberate myself from it.
My intention for this post is to share a glimpse of what it feels like for me to finally come up for air without the anxiety of a looming threat that would eventually pull me back down again. I name the main sources that threatened to drown me; I name the roots; I name the tools I used to set myself free - the time and effort it took and then, I name myself and I name my destiny. Unpacking comes later. This piece was a commemoration of finally being able to breathe again at my lungs full capacity. And the excitement I feel for feeling so strong after feeling so wary for so long. Rebirth. by Marie Antoine, The 2019 Kriyol Dance! Collective Public Voice The Nou Series, an experiment in embodied knowledge, resistance, and history that prioritizes “nou” (“us” in Haitian Creole) was a layered performance, choreographed and curated to explore the history of the Wyckoff House, documenting memories of native Lenape peoples and enslaved Africans in Canarsie, and the migration of Black Caribbeans to Brooklyn. Through a lens of muscle memory and spirituality, we hoped to build a connected narrative and express it through movement.
Ultimately, our goal was that by positioning our bodies as museum installations we can expand and interrogate stories and processes of cultural preservation and community identity. Each layer of our performance, from the wardrobe to the sequence of installations, contained a piece of this intention which added more depth to our storytelling. |
The BlogSak Rete Ou? (What's Stopping You? in Haitian Creole), holds space for reflections, meditations, poetry, video blogs, and capacity to captivate readers through creative writing. To the question, sak rete ou?, we respond "Nou Se Kriyol!" (We are the Children! in Haitian Creole), implying and calling on the strength, kindness, and revolution of our Haitian ancestors to move forward! Archives
September 2020
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