"The Transformations of Medusa" and the Serpentine Dance of Evolution and Emergence
Re: Masterclass – Networked Rites & The Quest for Morphic Fields of Compassion
Deadline: 31st July 2015
Facebook event page:
masterclass website:http://liladancefilm.wix.com/masterclass
If you wish to join us, please give us a shout as we are almost ready to go… The fee is minimal, we are after your creative (DNA) mind…
You only have to look at the Medusa straight on to see her. And she's not deadly. She's beautiful and laughing....
Hélène Cixous, "The Laugh of Medusa," 1971
According to Keller (2015) in the chapter entitled "The Unfinished Work," in 1949 Maya Deren and Jean Erdman started to work together on a filmed version of Erdman's solo piece The Transformations of Medusa, first performed in 1942. Though the film project was not realised due to the artists' opposing formal interests, they were both creative explorers of the invisible realms of the psyche and processed mythological archetypes and ritualistic forms inspired by 'primitive' cultures. Erdman introduced Deren to her husband, the mythologist Joseph Campbell, who later edited and published Deren's book Divine Horsemen, The Living Gods of Haiti.
Deren and Erdman sought to manifest and embody the invisible through their different art forms, i.e., film (Deren) and dance (Erdman). However, their commitment to the aesthetics of their different forms and conviction in their chosen medium's capacity to include the invisible didn't allow further collaboration.
Regardless of their different approaches, Erdman and Deren in particular, found in the Medusa archetype and myth generative and transformative creative metaphors and forms through which the repressed and violent aspects of the psyche could be mirrored, evolved and transformed. The two women engaged with the female body and psyche by the interrelations of opposites which they recognised in the goddess archetypes of Athena-Medusa and Medusa-Erzulie.
In Divine Horsemean, The Living Gods of Haiti (1953:144), Deren writes on the loa's cosmic forces which are required for the achievement of "some natural cosmic balance". In the case of the goddess Arzulie's loa, the labor needed for achieving balance and perfection is infinite and represented by the merciless and unhappy muse Medusa. Deren correlates Medusa and Erzulie as the latter drives humans to attain that which is beyond their capacity through dreaming. Endlessly, Erzulie-Medusa perpetuates in humans a sense of dissatisfaction and imperfection that demands new dreams, quests and achievements. Deren writes:
She is the divinity of the dream, and it is in the very nature of dream to begin where reality ends and to spin it and to send it forward in space, as the spider spins and sends forward its own thread.
In addition to pioneering modern art forms, Erdman and Deren utilised the woman's body and gaze to re-write myths and deduce alternative meanings from feminine perspectives. Erdman's poetic choreography transforms the Medusa myth into a challenging experiment in feminine self-empowerment. Through her dance, the Medusa claims her killing gaze. She is no longer a mirror image that kills those who look at her directly but the sole owner of her look and ultimate power. Thus, she can bring death in an active way through her gorgon eyes and not only serves death in a passive way as she kills involuntary those who happen to encounter her stare. While she holds and controls the opposites of life and death in her body, her powers cease to be manipulated by the psychic projections of those who cannot tolerate them.
For Deren, the Medusa is an integral part of a cosmic serpentine movement; nexus of an unstable balance that is regained through ritual, trance and possession. She moves in infinite spirals that spin in opposite directions like the bitter and wise aspects of beautiful Erzulie. The serpentine forms are most ancient and reflected in the dance of the waters of heaven which are stirred by the benevolent father serpent Damballa and his counterpart Ayida.
What can we learn from the Medusa archetype at this day and age? Can her gaze transform us through new knowledge and art forms? Can she, who is associated with the mechanism of fear and killings, show us how to untangle the prevalent narrative of violence?
These topics will be addressed in the Masterclass Networked Rites & The Quest for Morphic Fields of Compassion through daily ritualistic creative practice and theoretical investigation. It will include visionary visual art, dance, poetic text, video and intention. The creative practice will be embedded in the cyber 'waters of heaven' on the Waterwheel platform where it will be transformed into a collective artist mind and a prototype 'morphic field of compassion'. In addition, the process will conclude with the performative presentations of the participants in the spirit of the Serpentine Cosmic DNA Dance of Evolution and Emergence.
References
Deren, M. (1953) Divine Horsemen The Living Gods and Haiti, New York: McPherson & Company
Keller, S. (2015) Maya Deren Incomplete Control, New York: Colombia University Press
