Versus is an improvised, collaborative work between a group of experimental dancers and electronic musicians. Aimed at engaging improvisation as a way to rehearse resistance and practice plurality in the face of mounting extremism and societal polarization, Versus explores emergent dynamics between bodies and transdisciplinary co-creation as a study of radical solidarity. The work centers the concept of temporary worldbuilding as a modality of growing capacity in (and perhaps new neural pathways for) collaboration, mutability, and fluidity to offset an archeology of hierarchy, power, and control.  

Versus grew out of DxM, a related project primarily concerned with how our bodies and our music are archives of human history, with rhythm and melody stored deep in the most ancient parts of our brain. Versus investigates this channel between music and dance as a path to meet our past and make our future, a way to decipher our story both personal and historical.

Experimenting with tactics for negotiating, navigating and troubling wholeness, the composition of Versus is collectively devised continuously. The group tunes into emergent poetics within the stream of images, movements, and sound along both harmonic and discordant leads, troubling the idea that unity is the only peace. Versus is an experiment in being with—with other people, with ourselves, with the composite and expectant now. We aspire to demonstrate the embodiments, relations, and interplays that could compose new mythologies of collectivity. 

*PREMIERE POSTPONED FROM MARCH 2020 TO NOVEMBER 2020 AT COUNTERPULSE