We are Israeli artists Matan Zamir and Gal Naor (performers, choreographers, directors), living in Berlin and, since 2014, creating together under the artistic umbrella of The progressive wave (GbR), an inclusive creative collaborative.
We are devastated and heartbroken by the situation in our homeland and condemn all violence and war.
On the verge of an ethical and political crisis, and when the values of Western democracies are threatened to be questioned, we believe that if we are not part of the solution, we are part of the problem.
In the summer of 2023, we finished with the concept writing of Science of Signs III: The Water Warrior, where we elaborated on the criticality and urgency in creating peace-producing artistic and social content and, despite the inconvenience, dealing with the excess baggage of the untreated collective trauma of World War II (and the Jewish Holocaust in particular) to boldly mark 80 years to the fall of the Nazi regime in an anti-patriarchal, collaborative creative container, inviting a multicultural and multilingual creative container held in a German-Israeli network during 2024-25.
Inspired by a tale told in the native Brazilian-Amazonian tribes about the ancient Peace alliance between King Salomon and the Paje (Shaman-leader) of numerous Amazonian tribes (back when Salomon was King in Jerusalem,) our poetic vision is entering tribal Amazonian performative practices (and aesthetics) into the dark period of the Holocaust as an agency karmically clean the collective and reduce the venom of hate and ignorance.
In 2025, Science of Signs III: The Water Warrior will bring the Amazonian shamanic performative practice and aesthetics into the Nazi camps to perform a necessary surgery in the heart of the collective. Eighty years after the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau hate camp (1945), we are called to facilitate a modern poetic “exorcism” birthing through hardship a more decent and round reburial for the neglected collective trauma, rooted in today, here and now.
The heavy choice of such a disturbing theme came from a deep understanding that the final chapter in our performance trilogy must deal with the uncanny and uncomfortable “shadow work” of yesterday to fully invite the Goddess of Tomorrow, Divine Matriarchy (aka “the great unknown” / “divine darkness”) along with both painful and beautiful Peace teachings.
In October 2023, we woke up to a reality where the moral lesson of hate returns to knock on our doors as a collective, asking for recognition and healing.
Why Native Amazonian?
During Covid days, as part of Science of Signs III artistic research, we each received the DIS-TANZ-SOLO research fund and dedicated the seven-month individual exploration to Amazonian cultures, focusing on their music. The grant allowed us to travel to Brazil to learn closely the traditions of two indigenous Amazonian cultures, the Huni Kuin tribe and the Yawanawa tribe. Under their supervision, we went through certain initiations and purification diets to receive the sacred melodies and chants from them. Through the Indigenous Amazonian prism, the ancient poems and sacred melodies we received from them are like seeds that were being planted in us, and we carry them (and practice them). We are forever disciples and continue our studies.
On the socio-cultural aspect, a different yet helpful equivalence: similar to Deaf and Sign Language culture, same with the Natives; after spending proper time with them and learning their codes, we became their allies and received their permission and encouragement to spread the essence of their message through their music.
As pro-peace artistic activists in times of a post-modern biblical fight over who is indigenous to the land, we invite the peace-bringing earthy wisdom of the Native Amazonian to teach us all a lesson of Divine Morality and Nature Laws based on Peace and Love as streams of consciousness. Our work will be emotionally accompanied by live music of the Amazonian indigenous’ sacred healing melodies fusing German, Hebrew, and Arab poems, chants, and prayers, among many world languages.
Sign Language(s) will be dominant in our choreographic creation performed by Deaf and Sign Language performers.
SOS III: The Water Warrior (working title) is an SOS call for the intellectual on the threshold of World War III, the war over the mind and heart of the individual and the collective.
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