Embodied Kinesthetic Arts Practices with Arboreal Kin

Trees and forests are an important component of human and ecological health yet human destruction of forests continues at an accelerated rate. This research investigates embodied art practices as a means to shift human and tree relations from extraction to kinship. The investigation dances into the possibility that trees could be collaborators in an art-making process. The portfolio includes ten short video poems developed through a four-stage methodology of listening, tracing, translating and presenting movement investigations with trees. The portfolio is presented with reflections on the development of the work, field notes, contextual references and includes an informal artist’s talkback. The portfolio includes a lesson plan for group investigations into human and tree relationships and an outline for group investigations with fellow artists. The potential of dance practices to develop kinship bonds with trees was revealed by the art-making process and demonstrates the capacity of arts-based methodologies to shift our human epistemologies and ontologies. Further research into this and other arts methodologies, particularly collaborative and improvisational approaches, could be of huge benefit in adapting to climate change and supporting multi-species relational shifts.