Bones Collective
‘The magic of beasts belongs to the wild sorcerers who are part human, part spirit, part animal; the ones who dance the knife’s edge between the worlds of like and death, the incarnate and discarnate’ - Sarah Anne Lawless in Serpent Songs
We are a collective of looking at exploring a creative response to the planetary emergency through ritual, physical theatre, movement, myth & grief.
We emerged at the intersection of non violent direct action, activism, ritual and performance as a need to bring the spirit of the disappearing wilderness and its inhabitants into the city through a relationship and exploration with animal bones and the spirit of these feral creatures.
We started on Dartmoor with a small group of activists/artists, working on the land with animal skulls and bones. Since then we have created and developed a performance that was offered as part of Extinction Rebellion’s October Rebellion and participated in the 20 - 30 000 strong Grief March through central London. We developed work for Extinction Underground at Vault festival and were due to be in residence at the Dance Research Studio before Covid19 happened to research and develop our work and practice.
Our intention with working with ritual, physical theatre & animal bones is a space to honour the many lives, species, creatures, humans, insects, mammals & plants that have been and will be lost because of climate breakdown and the destruction of ecosystems and biodiversity. Our work feels like a humble offering to begin to come to terms with what this loss means.
Through opening up and exploring new boundaries within performance through site specific works and non traditional theatre spaces we hope to reach a variety of audiences: some who may expect to witness us, some who may not.
Through our work, we aim to reach into hearts and disrupt the apathy around the climate and ecological emergency, supporting folks to connect with the loss of life, through meeting a very real representation of death: bones.
“The performance cut through the bustle of background activity and noise in Trafalgar Square to create a moment and space in which a quieter mode of grief and contemplation was opened up; a slow careful sincere focus on the real and the tangible. As a viewer I was invited, or challenged, to consider what the death of the animal kingdom meant to me and what I am doing to reflect on and respect that loss. Moreover by deflecting my attention to an animal skull via the performer I was given licence to be open to the reality that underlies the whole climate crisis: that of our own deaths and the loss of peace and civilised culture with all the loving traditions and cultural expressions that give it meaning.” - Alistair Lambert.
