Ancient Body

Solo performance performed and

choreographed and sound by: Aoibhinn O'Dea

Duration: 8 mins

Costume Design: Amie Egan

Location: The World Irish Academy

Date: May 2023

The ancient body, buried within the mountains, trees and the ground beneath our feet. This landscape that shapes us is made up of shapeshifters still lurking amongst the land. Aoibhinn has been looking for ways to reconnect to the ancient body shape, shifting through ancestral lineage, artifacts and mythology archetypes. 

 

With the majority of the population living in cities, there has been great loss in connection to the land. What we believed to be once part of us, a higher being, is now something to be built on, bought and sold.

 

Aoibhinn attempts to connect with this ancient body through performance. The body and land has not changed but how we live in them has changed drastically. She focuses on sounds that still stimulate our amygdala to fight, flight or freeze. Focusing on the carnyx (an iron age battle horn) and low and high frequencies she attempts to capture the sound of the ancient land in 8 minutes.