Billed as “an antidote to a capitalistic era of over-productivity, disembodiment, and dislocation”, Us and All of This was one of the rare cases where my experience lived up to what I was sold, acting as a shining example of what installation, dance, and sound work can be when allowed to exist at scale.
“…by being presented with more unique performances than I could practically pay attention to, I was able to focus on individual performers. Watching as dancers teared up, smiled at an old friend, or furrowed a brow led me to question how a work could be so big and so small at the same time.”
“Zink and English have achieved something incredibly special here – a true collaboration with highlights coming from both mediums present within the work, it was an honour to watch it in this iteration, with these performers, at this location. Installation art has the ability to change the world in which it exists, and nowhere have I found this to be more true than with Us and All of This.”
In a world increasingly defined by rising geopolitical tension, ecological mismanagement, deteriorating labour conditions and social isolation, Liesel Zink’s Us And All Of This offers a rare moment of calm reflection. Bringing together 100 local dancers for a large-scale contemporary performance work, the premiere season is unfolds across three large plot of urban public space, not in the pursuit of profiteering , but in the pursuit of togetherness and communion.
In a world increasingly defined by rising geopolitical tension, ecological mismanagement, deteriorating labour conditions and social isolation, Liesel Zink’s Us And All Of This offers a rare moment of calm reflection. Bringing together 100 local dancers for a large-scale contemporary performance work, the project momentarily unfolds across a large plot of urban public space, not in the pursuit of profiteering , but in the pursuit of togetherness and communion.
In collaboration with sound artist Lawrence English and dramaturg Martyn Coutts, Liesel is working with three lead dancers to devise a series of choreographic and improvisational scores. The 100 participants, of various ages, ethnicities, genders and body types, will be split into small groups in which they collaborate in series of four workshops with the lead dancers. The ultimate outcome will be a meditative and sculptural dance piece spanning roughly 45 minutes.
Us And All Of This explores collectively and assembly as the antithesis of exploitation. It rejects the positioning of humans as something separate to the environment, and challenges the fast-paced, isolated structure of society. In this way, the performers move not on the landscape, but with the landscape, acknowledging our place as one part of a complex ecology. And for the participants, the experience extends beyond the performance itself into a ritual of coming together.
Us And All Of This forges a space for a diverse collection of people to gather, to learn, and to embody their shared resistance to an atomised way of life. It is not only a performance but a process; an exercise in the gentle act of shared creation.
