[A]     Interviews/conversations: ​

This is the first point of interaction with the participants. We talk for as long as they need.  It is a slow unfurling. I do not dictate the tempo or enforce a specific desired outcome, I want to make enough space for what emerges.  This stage is rich and honest, complex and compassionate. I learn about their position, their experiences, their backgrounds, their personal kaupapa (philosophy).

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[B]     Workshops:

Only once the participants feel ready, we plan for time in the studios to workshop and explore movement material. Depending on the participant, and their own background, and interests, we try to explore methodologies anchored in post colonial thinking. An example is the workshop with Kowhai Decheurs. In this workshop she physically reflects/responds to the horizon line, as was traditional in Maori music and movement composition.  She responds to Riki Gooch Pirihi’s compositions. We spend a lot of time exploring a sense of energetic connection to the land/whenua. She works from a low second position, the strong beat in the music and her body are one. 

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In the Djibril Sal, we explore hip rotations. His practice is very interested in exploring the restriction of certain movements. We discuss how for many colonised or westernised cultures, movement from the hips was oppressed, prohibited, sexualised, exoticised and/or condemned. (I note that my Greek grandfather would not allow my mother to dance the τσιφτετέλι/tsifteteli, as he deemed it too Eastern, too sexualised.  He wanted to position himself (and his family) as distinctly Western European, and as such the music and dancing from his birthplace of Asia Minor were not permitted in the household, once he was re-located to Athens.) 

 

[C]     Choreographic practice-research:

Alongside the workshop/interviews with dance-artists, I have also allowed my own choreographies to be informed and shaped by this research project.  In March 2026, I presented a work titled Bleed Out, in Wellington/Te Whanganui-a-Tara. In the creation of this work I explored creating in a way that felt more culturally embodied, culturally situated and non-hierarchical. I consciously used tools that differ from the ‘standard’ dance rehearsal.  Humour and play had a legitimised place in the studio.  The rehearsal schedule was slower and longer, leaving more space for exploration, non-sequitars, diversions and distractions. In a sense, I allowed my Pākeha/white New Zealander mask to fall away, and embraced working in a way that felt more authentic and specific to me. This process (and the production) felt like a very positive shift. Encouraged by the research, and using the rehearsal space to further evolve that research, I felt I created something closer to my own cultural identity.  

 

The photos I have used throughout this website are from this production (enormous gratitude to the dancer-collaborators, Georgia Beechey and Luke Hana, pictured).

 

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[D]     Note-taking/workbooks:

In my note-taking, I record what I notice in the conversations and the workshops. What are the patterns and similarities that arise with the various practitioners? How do they differ?  With regards to the notes on my reading, I record which theoretical frameworks best buttress my understanding of what is occurring in the practice-research. The writing switches between Greek and English.

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[E]     The reading research:

I have included a bibliography at the end of this portfolio. These are the articles and books that have fed directly into this research. A number of writers have become particularly significant for me. They have become lighthouses, guiding me to different and evolving pathways of approaching this research.  These writers are Erin Manning, Rosi Braidotti, bell hooks, and Linda Tuhiwai Smith.