Vibrational kinship: Resonances of moving, sounding and listening bodies

This project investigates vibration of sound and/through movement, as bodily felt experience, phenomena and connective force. Central to the research are questions on how vibration of sounding voice, resonance and rhythm can activate connections between bodies and spaces through multisensory experiences - auditory, visual and kinaesthetic. Furthermore it explores how this enquiry can contribute to practices of dance and choreography, and aims to unfold expansive and multidimensional perspectives of the human as relational and rhythmic being in the world. Using a practice-as-research (PAR) methodology, the project brings dance and choreography into dialogue with sound art and the philosophies of phenomenology and feminist new materialism. Through an intertwining of theory and practice I engage with key concepts of vibration, rhythm, resonance and kinship. The research is informed by multi-sensory practices of listening and attention-giving, specifically in the work of choreographer Deborah Hay (2000) and composer Pauline Oliveros (2005). The engagement with feminist new materialism, invites notions of the posthuman and other-than-human, multiplicity and entanglements, through Karen Barad (2007), Donna Haraway (2010) and Jane Bennett (2016). As a researcher I bring to the project my extensive professional experience as a dance artist, voice practitioner, choreographer and teacher-facilitator. The project will develop through studio-based dance sessions that experiment with voice, sound, movement and perception as material; choreographic presentations and performance events; collaborative workshops with fellow artists/researchers from the fields of dance and sound art. This project aims to contribute with original knowledge in forms of cross-disciplinary and expanded practices of dance and choreography in conversation with the sonic. Supported by phenomenology and feminist new materialism, it engages the vibrational as multisensory, and argues for a multidimensional human experience of intra-connectedness, transformation and agency.