K.o.W 2021

In response to the current global circumstances, Knowledge of Wounds is kindling its second iteration. We are excited to bring together a constellation of Indigenous peoples and diverse audiences from throughout the world, with no geographical centre, as an entirely online program.

Knowledge of Wounds continues to evolve as a mercurial presenting platform and trans-hemispheric network of First Nations and diasporic artists and cultural workers. K.o.W centers Indigenous bodies as ongoing sites of queer and ancestral kinstillation, and honors the world-making medicine of bodies that know rupture, the many lineages of threshold-dwellers engaged in collective dreaming of sovereign futures, and the nurturance of Indigiqueer joy, beauty and survivance.

Building on the relationships fostered through the inaugural gathering, we have expanded the program to become a global convergence in partnership with five organizations: Performance Space New York (NY), Portland Institute for Contemporary Art (PDX), the Momentary (AR), Ballroom Marfa (TX) and Performance Space Sydney (NSW, Australia), and Blakdance (Australia).

Foregrounding Indigenous principles of seasonal movement, ceremonial time, and celestial alignment, K.o.W 2021-22 will unfold as a series of digital events over the course of an entire solar year, beginning on the 2021 June Solstice. Honoring Indigenous time and space in the spirit of the Wiradjuri term Yindyamarra (the qualities of respect, slowness, growth in accordance with organic cycles), individual events will be announced throughout the year as the program evolves.

The 2021-22 Knowledge of Wounds program revolves around four themes: Breath, S/kin, Blood, and Bone. These elemental components resonate with solar and lunar cycles, honoring Indigenous rhythms and temporalities. Each quarter interweaves four modes of dialogic engagement: 1) a bodymind-centered praxis;  2) a four-week course; 3) a keynote address/conversation; 4) a round table discussion.

K.o.W focuses on the intersections of Indigeneity, gender, sexuality, and the body. By centering praxes of mutual care, sovereignty, and accessibility, this program asks how we can engage diverse forms of embodiment, techniques, and forms that honor our wounds as points of entry to other selves and other worlds. 

In lighting this fire, we honor our entwined ancestral lineages of blood, practice, struggle and affinity. We humbly honor those who have preceded us, those who are yet to come, and the continuity of Indigenous cultural brilliance in which our work finds its anchor. This is a space held by and for Indigenous peoples, though we welcome all who arrive in the spirit of good relations.