What is it?

The Dream of the Owl Sisters / listening at the river
October 18, 2013 @ 5:17 pm

As part of a creative residency platteforum.org, I’m in the process of working with the South Platte River and the land it traverses. Like all city/river landscapes, this one is wild, shabby, and mysterious because of how rivers push energy through a place and because lots of people use the river. October 18th marks the 18th anniversary of my first land-based performance, Hunter’s Moon. thearchitectureofhoney.com

Even though that performance happened during the Harvest Moon, I named it after the other as a way to skip time and so that, a month later, when the Hunter’s Moon rose, I’d be reminded of the performance and settle into what I hoped would be a happy memory. This year, on the 18th, the full Hunter’s Moon rises at 6:08 pm (RMT) with the sun lowering about eight minutes later.

The performance takes place along the South Platte River near 15th Street. Go, first, to PlatteForum (1610 Little Raven Street in Denver) to pick up a map. Wear walking shoes. Prepare for weather. There is plenty of street parking along Little Raven Street and, if using mass transit, the Union Station light rail stop is immediately east of PlatteForum.

The Dream of the Owl Sisters / listening and drawing

The Dream of the Owl Sisters started with a drawing that, while commissioned for two little girls in Paris, has been executed exclusively in Colorado in the presence of one of my elderly clients who has a version of dementia manifesting, primarily, in repetitive language and behavior. The quality of repetition that shapes the drawing is, I believe, the same quality as the conversations with my client, a retired English teacher who, as a teenager, was harvested from central Illinois, sent to a teacher’s college in Iowa, then shipped west in order to educate mountain children. Her life starts over every few minutes and, in that short lifespan, she manages to tell me much. When I look at the drawing, I’m not only reliving our conversations, but experiencing the way a human mind works or, rather, two minds: our collaboration being an engagement of remembrance and deterioration.

The Dream of the Owl Sisters / an anthology

I’ve invited people to either come to the performance at the river or, if that’s not possible, to witness the moonrise from wherever they are and make something in response to that witnessing: a poem, an essay, or drawing or photograph or ritual or something else to be included in an anthology of the event.

At the river and in the book . . .

Camilla Alexander (Boulder, CO)
Judy Anderson (Denver, CO)
Sandra Binion (Venice, Italy)
Doug Bonner (Fuzhou, Fujian)
Roxanne Carter (Oxford, Ohio)
Rudi Cerri (Denver, CO)
Barrie Cole (Africa)
Joan Dickinson (Denver, CO)
Jane Dodge (Singapore)
Jackie Farritor (Denver, CO)
Mary Hawley (Cambridge, England)
H.R. Hegnauer (Denver, CO)
Rilva Hoon (Cairo, Egypt)
Lorriane Moretti (Chicago, IL)
TaraShea Nesbitt (Boulder, CO)
Matthew Owens (Laramie, WY)
Bin Ramke (Denver, CO)
Jen Rinaldi (Denver, CO)
Joanna Ruocco (Denver, CO)
Sandi Ste. George (Portland, ME)
Christina Stott (Conifer, CO)