September Events

Works in progress showcase, Rhizomatic choir, and Best Boyfriend

Praise the beginnings of rain coming to the PNW to douse the forest fires! Hope you all are staying safe and cooling your heels

In this newsletter:

The Bleeding Circle works in progress showcase

In person Rhizomatic Choir in PDX

What’s happening on patreon

The Bleeding Circle: 6 month reflection and Works in Progress

The Bleeding Circle, a group in apprenticeship to the spirit of blood and menstruation has been in ceremony for the last 6 months. We have been researching, playing in, and creating works from the origins of culture making. Larissa and others will share what we've been getting into; meditative drawing, group offerings, clowning our ghosts, and emerging "metaforms" from Judy Grahn's work on menstruation as the impetus for establishing measurement and externalizing inner knowings.

Thursday 9/21 5:30-7:30pmPST on zoom

To attend, get a ticket here, by donation, NOTAFLOF. A portion of donations will go toward a local organization TBD

To learn more about The Bleeding Circle go here

In person Rhizomatic Choir in PDX

This September, Animist Arts will be offering 4 x 90-min Rhizomatic Choir practice experiences in person in Portland, OR (Laurelhurst Park).

Rhizomatic Choir is a vocalization, movement and meditation play-practice designed for western/modern people to re-learn and re-culture our most ancient improvisational and collaborative skills. Based on central African hunter-gatherer polyphonic group singing (the oldest continuous somatic practice of humankind, originating 300,000 years ago by our shared original grandmothers), this is a communal ritual practice, deliberate counter dominance training and culturemaking for our current apocalyptic omnicidal context.

In Rhizomatic Choir, we use no discernable words or phrases, just vowel and consonant sounds, as well as our bodies and immediate earthly surroundings - no manufactured instrumentation or amplified sound devices. We attune and listen deeply to the ecosystem of the place we are in, ourselves and the group in order to create, discover and regenerate together, in timed rounds followed by periods of silent integration & group reflection.

You can read more about the project and its origins HERE.

DETAILS FOR JOINING PORTLAND SEPTEMBER CHOIRS:

THURSDAYS: 9/14, 9/21, 9/28 @ 6-7:30 PM at Laurelhurst

SUNDAY: 9/24 after the Equinox, @ 1-2:30 PM at Laurelhurst

• We’ll meet at 5:45 PM (12:45 PM on Sunday) at Laurelhurst Park on the lawn by bathrooms (SE Ankeny entrance), then migrate together to find a good spot to practice.

• Bring yoga mats, chairs, blankets, layers; whatever you need to feel comfortable in a variety of positions.

• We are not requiring masks or vaccination status; we’re asking everyone to determine their own comfort level + spacing, and care for themselves in a good way; I will have a microphone to amplify the facilitation so it’ll be possible for folks to spread out and still participate.

• Text Rachel L (971) 303-9718‬ to RSVP or ask ?s.

• Suggested donation $30-$15, NOTAFLOF

• Venmo @dare-sohei or paypal.me/daresohei

Visit our new Rhizomatic Choir page to read more and stay in the loop for more practice opportunities and tour dates for Oct-Nov in Seattle, Tacoma and beyond.

Expressive Meditation for patrons of Animist Arts

You Feeling Me Feeling You (L) expressive meditation continues! Thanks to those of you who heard the call to come live to keep these practices sustained. Keep coming to build shared momentum and a collective field.

Tuesday 9/12 10am-11:15amPST

Tuesday 9/26 10am-11:15amPST

Bring settling and coherence to yourself and your networks through the natural celebration of the relationship between things. We enter "expressive meditation" ; movement, sound, stillness, and play sourced from the subtle/energetic. This is a complete practice on its own, but also contributes to a well nourished baseline state that allows us to show up more fully for death clown methods, writing/drawing or really any creative expression, our work as facilitators and practitioners, and more.

Improvised and guided, no cross talk/interaction until the end. Recorded and posted to patreon afterwards.

Live events for Playground tier patrons:

Play with BEST BOYFRIEND

Monday 9/11 5:30-7pmPST

Come be interviewed by BEST BOYFRIEND! A character developed by Larissa during our summer Play to Find Out Salon series. Best Boyfriend is on a mission to be the best boyfriend to The World, interviewing anyone he comes across on all the best ways to care for, protect, listen, and express love in its many forms. Come see him get high on his own sincerity!

Nondual Theater Jam Virtual (L)

These require a minimum of 5 ppl to run, so sign up early and mark your calendars!

Sunday 9/24 10am-12:30pmPST

This Nondual Theater Jam Virtual session will focus on Tabooboo Play: MYTHIC LEVEL.  "Tabooboos" are qualities, experiences, and roles that  we tend to avoid or crave individually and collectively. We will build  our capacity to enjoy working from Totality, incorporating exiled  elements like pain and exhaustion in our expression  as opposed to  narrow definitions of art or beauty (organic deviance). We will also  train in how to ride out intense energy shifts and release without  overwhelming ourselves or the collective field (ecstatic restraint). Our  "techniques" will include meditation/contemplation, character  development and interviews, live coaching, witnessing, and reflection  processes.

watch the intro video to organic deviance and ecstatic restraint here

This is Embodied Research guided by nondual (holistic) animist  principles, the roots of creative expression, and play. Devising as  metabolizing, and metabolizing as devising! Varies each month. Training  in light ritual improv, devising, subtle sensing, and co-dreaming. They  will include elements from previous offerings like Deathclown methods,  Social Curious, lay the f*ck down, What Play Be, as well as our combined  training in Viewpoints, Buffon, Butoh, Systemic Constellations, Theater  of the Oppressed, Physical Theater, and more. As always our knowledge  of nervous system health, how organisms learn, and nondual animist  relating will steward everything we do.

*Cut off to sign up is one hour before start time. *