Knowledge of Wounds: S/kin Keynote with Kim TallBear and Daniel Browning
Oct 21, 2021
Performance Space, Performance Space New York (NY), Portland Institute for Contemporary Art (PDX), the Momentary (AR), Ballroom Marfa (TX) and Blakdance (Australia) present
Knowledge of Wounds: S/kin
Knowledge of Wounds: S/kin SJ Norman and Joseph M. Pierce
Curators
SJ Norman, Joseph M. Pierce
Producer
Carlee Smith
Designer and Digital Producer
Chloe Alexandra Thompson
Knowledge of Wounds: S/kin
23 September - 20 December
Curated by SJ Norman (Koori, Wiradjuri descent) and Joseph M. Pierce (citizen of the Cherokee Nation), this series of digital gatherings and events unpacks notions of S/kin through the knowledge and expertise of First Nations artists and cultural workers from across the world.
Our skin is a sacred threshold. The ritual breaching of the skin is a ceremonial technology utilised by many peoples in the transference of ancestral knowledge. Through a codex of scars and markings made on the body’s supple container, we make visible our kinship ties and initiatory pathways. In the pelts of our animal relatives, we swaddle our infants and shroud our dead. The skin is the beginning of one body’s knowing of another: our skin hungers, our skin burns, our skin yields to the touch of a beloved. We honour the depth of wisdom worn in the softened faces and hands of our Elders. Through our skin, we receive the sun’s nourishment, the fire’s warmth, the embrace of water and wind. The bare soles of our feet find their home in the soil of our sovereign lands.
Unfolding as a series of digital events over the course of an entire solar year, Knowledge of Wounds continues to evolve as a mercurial presenting platform and trans-hemispheric network of First Nations and diasporic artists and cultural workers. Knowledge of Wounds focuses on the intersections of Indigeneity, gender, sexuality, and the body. By centring praxes of mutual care, sovereignty, and accessibility, this program asks how we can engage diverse forms of embodiment, techniques, and forms that honour our wounds as points of entry to other selves and other worlds. A space held by and for Indigenous peoples, the project welcomes all who arrive in the spirit of good relations.
For the second celestial season of Knowledge of Wounds, we consider S/kin as the means through which we connect and ground into our kinstillatory relationships
All Knowledge of Wounds events will be live streamed through Vimeo and embedded on the Knowledge of Wounds website. These events will be available on demand after the event has aired.
S/kin Keynote with Kim Tall Bear and Daniel Browning
Tickets on sale as program of events is announced
Price: We are firm in the conviction that Indigenous people should not have to exchange currency for access to our own knowledge and cultural spaces. Rather than a set ticket price, Indigenous participants are invited to make an offering, in the spirit of reciprocity and mutual distribution of resources. Access to all events will be on a donation basis, with the donation amount to be decided upon according to individual capacity. If you have less, pay what you can. If you are financially resourced, and wish to support our work, we welcome a more size-able donation.
