Sunday, January 25, 2015 from 2–6 p.m.
Oakopolis Gallery, 447 25th Street, Oakland, CA 94612
Two workshop combined into one on a sliding scale: $50 to $150. Limited to 7 participants.
Contact Anne Hege with questions and to register. [email protected]
Anne Hege will be at the gallery on the Saturday afternoons of January 10 (prior to the workshop) and January 31 (post workshop). She will be in the conversation lounge talking about the workshop history, expectations, and experience.
From the Waters: Reclaiming What is Lost
This workshop is dedicated to the exploration of ways we can reconnect with people, places, or parts of ourselves that we realize we have lost and yet still need to hold a place for in our lives. Carrie Ahern and Anne Hege will guide the workshop participants through a series of exercises that will become the building blocks for a ritual we will create together.
All participants are invited to bring a sonic memory of what they would like to reclaim. This could be an audio recording, an object that makes sound, or a spoken memory. These sounds will be uploaded into a computer so that they can be played as a sonic altar. Through the movement of a video game controller, each participant will have a turn to compose/play the sonic altar. Simultaneously, participants will collectively “play” a sound environment triggered by their movements while holding a circle of rope. Calling on old practices of lifting an anchor or pulling up a sail, the group will pull the rope, as if pulling in what is lost. How can we be together in grief through movement and sound? How can technology shape our rituals of the future? The workshop strives to create a community for the grief process and explore ways that one can remain in relationship with those who have passed on. This workshop will be offered with The Art of Burial.
The Art of Burial
The Art of Burial is a participatory fantasy burial ritual facilitated by Carrie Ahern.
Limited to 7 participants, this ritual is an antidote to our cultural blindness to our inevitable mortality. By associating our own burial with pleasure and personal preference and giving each participant measures of control and surrender it lessens the grip of fear about death. Ahern asks participants to imagine their own burial – as if they are alive. What does their body want? This burial is not about any real scenario but is open to each participant’s imagination. What does this fantasy burial feel like, look like, sound like, smell like? What is its environment, its setting? After writing their burial wishes down, each person states their wishes out loud.
Finally, Ahern leads the other participants in the room to “enact” each person’s burial for them while they themselves are completely passive. No dance or movement experience is needed to participate. Far from morbid, participants find The Art of Burial to be blissful take on a fearful topic. A few comments from participants … “blissful and empowering” …. “a very special experience.” This workshop will be offered with the From the Waters workshop.
See also Be|Art|Now Workshops at Pacific School of Religion www.psr.edu/beartnow-workshops