Lohs see-Eh-teh coh-LOH-rehs
“And that day at the Great Salt Lake as I looked at my feet, even those feet seemed a great distance away, in this terrain without scale, in which the near and the far folded into each other, in which puddles were oceans and sand ridges mountain ranges.” – The Blue Distance. A Field Guide to Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit
Lohs see-Eh-teh coh-LOH-rehs is a performance that reflects on the nature of water and the statement: “El mar de los siete colores en San Andrés / The sea of the seven colors in San Andres.” San Andrés is a Colombian Island where my mom and her family are from. My inability to understand and define the exact seven colors that surround this island has inspired this project. My grandmother, Mamimo had a ritual that cool her off on hot days in San Andrés. On her vanity she had a box that contained a cotton applicator in which she used to put powder over her body. As she touched her skin with the cotton ball, white smoke emerged from her skin like magic. It was a powder as thin and volatile as baby powder. Thinking of this ritual reminded me of the impeccable white sand of San Andrés. When the waves roll over the sand on the beach you can begin to see one of the seven colors. Is the deep navy blue color that can be seen in satellite photos of San Andrés one of the seven colors? It is a dark color that carefully attempts to touch the coast of the island. The blue velvet fabric that I’m using for this performance, references to the deep rich navy blue through its colors and texture. The quest of defining the seven blue colors has raised many questions. For example, was one of these colors visible in the blue tiny flowers that my grandmother used when she sewed my mom’s wedding dress? Are the seven colors the same ones that I imagine when I ask my family to describe them to me? Are those seven colors actually the same as the memories that I have of them? For me performance evokes intimate feelings that cannot be described in words but are better expressed through movement. Engaging these fragile human states is the pivotal endeavor in my performance work. The performance Lohs see-Eh-teh coh-LOH-rehs uses navy blue velvet as a dance floor. The performers dance to Caribbean music and as they dance their feet release white powder that creates different tones of blue over the dance floor. The movement of the performers is traced by the white marks left by the powder. At the end of the performance the marks over the velvet will reference the movement by water.