Mayfield Brooks' “vision hours” will be one of the performances presented at the Philadelphia Death and Arts Festival. (Photo of Caelum A'Hearn.)
Philadelphia: A new biannual Philadelphia Festival of Death and Arts (PDAF) has been announced, incorporating performance and educational elements in order to transform the commitment focused on the person and the community with aging, death and mourning. The inaugural festival, which will present performances of five artists, end -of -life educational workshops, panels, plea opportunities and experiences to treat and collectively reflect on mortality, is set from May 29 to June 1 Laurel Hill cemetery. Partners include the cemetery, Tête-Tête dance theater,, The collective for radical death studies,, The threshold collective,, This sacred desertand more.
“The festival offers many ways to engage with mortality: yours or a loved one,” the co-founder of the Annie Wilson festival said in a statement. “Whether by approaching a practical aspect of death which, unattended, can make death even more stressful than it is already, or by offering a space to reflect together on the deep mysteries of aging, death and mourning.”
Original works include::
- A body in a cemetery, An exploration specific to the site of time, season, landscape, architecture and culture by the award -winning interpreter MacArthur Eiko Otake
- GrillA solo movement play exploring the realities of aging while Black by the choreographer of Pew Shavon Norris
- Visualization hoursAn interdisciplinary performance questioning the spectacle and the commodification of death and black sorrow by the award -winning interpreter Bessie Mayfield Brooks
- The Mourning IV policy, A continuation of interventions specific to the site on the subject of sorrow by the indigenous interdisciplinary artist of Philly Donchristian Jones
- decipher the nodes in pine beams, By the cellist and experimental musician Mel HSU, an atmospheric reinterpretation of the symphonies and (many) vinyls his grandfather cherished
Workshops and group discussions for all ages will cover guardian subjects, end -of -life, old black conversations, decolonization of death, green burial and breakage, to sail in a terminal diagnosis, how to “die for cheap” in Philadelphia, and more. Death professionals understand the death of death Narinder sometimesscholars of The collective for radical death studiesLaurel Hill Funeral Home Funeral Directors Pat Quigley and Tasha Dugan, Death Doula and founder of Philly End of life Doula Collective Isabel Knight, Death Doula and Green Burial Advocate Nefertiti Moore, and ecotherapist and Langa Guardian Krista Nelson.
THE Philadelphia Festival of Death and ArtsThe mission is to transform the culture of death of that which is too medical and taboo into one of meaning and in -depth care, focusing common and individual experiences, practices and traditions. The PDAF believes that the poetics of art, when associated with pragmatic tools and space for a shared reflection, can offer support affirming life to individuals and their loved ones.
