Mama!

Mama! ponders how the loss of my mother three weeks into my creative life affects the way I think about and create dance. I am constantly analyzing the ways this profound loss shapes my life, but here I am digging into how it informs my choreographic interests and methods. I have found that the choreography of death, grief, and life as a motherless daughter (which I would argue started long before my mother’s death) is intrinsic to the way I make work. I use my past writings, lived experiences, and current tendencies to explore these topics. I try to let the memories flow through me in order to analyze their influence. I am experimenting with form through the use of footnotes as a space for details I may be inclined to leave unsaid. The parts of this story I wouldn’t share on a first date. The inner-dialogue of my recollection of this time in my life. This paper is an attempt to better understand how I am still processing this period that was so pivotal yet still so obscure. I am not writing facts; I am recounting something ephemeral and relating it to my love - no, need - for another ephemera, dance.