NETWORK addresses human survival and what we truly need– from sustainable living practices to communal engagement and empathy, as we recognize and build our resilience.
Considering climate change, racial inequity and other immediate crises (the COVID-19 virus) and the economic and civil impacts of them all, the project is inspired by systems of communication, resource-sharing and survival employed in tree communities. How can we see and feel connectedness, to our own roots, families (blood or chosen) and communities? And how might working directly with tree communities, help us see, feel and recognize our interdependence—with one another and responsibility toward all life. Trees and mushrooms have elaborate root systems under the earth, largely unseen by the naked eye. These same kind of root systems are required for the building of communities and societies. The unseen roots of communities are the energetic pulls to center; social or artistic meeting sites that gather people in and bind them through shared experience, empathy and exchange.
Based on experiential research in the environs of the Djerassi land and trees our team of performers, scientists, urban foresters, community tree stewards and designers will create a multi-dimensional, participatory, tactile experience–working with the trees, land, and site; dance, theater and media design; and material installation. In addition to an experiential, live, tactile, embodied (and we hope transformative) experience, that connects participants directly with trees, nature and their own bodies—there is a larger social impact goal of the project, which is to share research and resources with our audience participants in ways that may support their local communities.
Working together with a team of national and international artists, we are devising research methods and a creative model based on horizontal exchange, trust-worthiness and healing our scarcity model thinking, in the effort toward a more sustainable and resilient way of living and exchanging.
PROJECTED PROJECT PREMIERE: SUMMER 2022
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CURRENT RESIDENCY:
Djerassi Artist Resident Program: Day-use Residency, Summer 2021 Artistic Director, Krista DeNio is working together with Chloe Crotzer (biologist) preparing project model foundations, applying biological processes of tree root systems, to choreographic processes and developing the project design with an interdisciplinary team of collaborators (performers, scientists, designers, musicians, technologist), for a 2022 production at Djerassi, co-produced by Djerassi, CounterPulse and KDMG.
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PREVIOUS RESEARCH + RESIDENCIES:
KDMG Residency July 2020: Krista DeNio and Chloe Crotzer embarked on interdisciplinary research, bringing together performative and somatic work with biology, for the NETWORK project–in the trees of the Santa Cruz Mountains. They worked in Boulder Creek, Henry Cowell State park, Big Basin, and Wilder Ranch.
Laboratorio Condensacion July 2019; Krista DeNio worked in research residency and workshop, Mexico City, with Arely Landeros and Martin Lanz Landazuri and led experiments with workshop participants (performers, scientists, community workers) at Centro Nacional de Las Artes (CENART).
Other research workshops and residencies have included: BIONEERS Conference October 2017; KDMG & Dance Monks collaborate at Bioneers in an immersive experience on the grounds of the festival. The heart of this research was at the intersection of two long-term projects: NETWORK (Krista DeNio>>Moving Ground) and Tree of Life (Dance Monks), International Interdisciplinary Artist Consortium and Moving Arts Lab @ Earthdance, July 2017; Krista presented several workshops to colleagues and students, and collaborated in idea sharing with collaborators. Krista choreographed a student work that was a part of BDP @ U.C. Berkeley April 2017.
