Hello my name is Laura, I am one of the directors of Exit Map and I am what you call the mind and heart behind this project but it wouldn’t be anything without the many people who co-created this project, produced audios and took part, especially my .... co-directors Anne-Gaëlle Thiriot, Tania Soubry and long term audio collaborator Alice Labant who joined me in creating this archive that was generously supported by Siobhan Davies Studios.

We created a graph, a timeline and conducted interviews to give a sense of the work and how the various strands and perspectives merge and meet.

Moving On are audio projects that were conceived by 17 dance artists during the Covid isolation. Each project was about 2 hours long and offered 3-4 individual yet collectively woven voices that facilitated a weekly practice and provided for much needed wellbeing. Our ambition was to instill mobility and by making use of parks we moved outdoors furthering a connectivity within our own body by relating our bodies to nature. For instance, we inspired grounding by speaking about roots and breathing by observing how the branches resemble our lungs and along the way created and refined tools to make experiential anatomy, somatics and the poetry of dance accessible through words and sounds only.

Initially we wanted to make sure that we, the local SE London collective of humans, were OK because people all around us suffered from the effects of being socially distanced and from immobility by always being at home. Progressively various aspects naturally grew and opened our perceptions to how we make sense of nature, how language and collectivity lay the foundation for personal, professional and social development and how dance is being reassigned new meaning when we move with nature; the one outside of us and the one inside of us becoming increasingly inseparable. We found ourselves connected to the more-than-human and by engaging with it every week, like a ritual, it changed us, gave us strength and an outlook for a future where life and matter are more organically linked.

Covid gave us time. Although we made little money which went back to our artists, we gained through exchanges, new collaborations, personal and professional development, all possible because we had time. It allowed us to move closer as a collective of human beings and the more-than-human as a new spaciousness expanded our notion of ecosystems and the growing and weaving of self with other became a dance itself.

In the aftermath of Covid the project started to feel meaningless as people sped up, went back to pubs and traveled the world again. We received this archiving grant by SDD and two days on the Arts Council England offered financial support to enter new stages. While there is more to tell, what feels paramount now is for us to remember what we gained such as the importance to slow down so that new connections based on embodied sensitivity and listening to what is going on can inform changes. In the age of information where communication changed and carved a social evolution we believe that an embodied presence is needed more. Breathing, feeling the ground and giving space to feel, activates the shifts so as to move on together.

To inspire these processes you will find some of the audio guides and projects we created in the timeline to take to the park because they can lead to a connectivity and engagement that is much needed. Besides of course reading and visually digesting interviews and graph. Should you be interested to join our hub of local SE London dance artists that continue to go to the park and move, feel free to join our Openly Spaced Out meetup. You are warmly welcome.

Thank you for reading and sharing the journey.

Laura

🌳🎶🌿🎧