Maintaining Rhythm, Video Performance, 2019. 

The Kolo is a Croatian circle dance and is performed at cultural festivities, traditionally by more than 2 people who form a circle by holding hands. The steps, movements, and costumes (known as Noše) differ by Balkan region of origin. The accompanying music is fast, and each person dances the Kolo differently, with the steps varying according to the dancer’s ability and personality. With the combination of music and different techniques, each person has a different virtuosity, which at times constructs forceful sounds.

In Maintaining Rhythm, the performance expresses the ritualistic experience of caring for others. Multiple factors contribute to the preservation, deconstruction, nurture and dismantling of the self. The work symbolises the individual understanding of self, including the requirement to come together to care for family members. The significance of the dance is that in contemporary Croatian culture, it is performed at joyous celebrations. The sounds of the stomping of feet carrying out the dance, along with my voice speaking the words I would say to my grandfather each evening to get him to bed. These were the familiar and repetitive words used daily to care for my grandfather, who was blind and had dementia. It was rhythmic and repetitive to maintain his rhythm, his dance to get to bed. This is akin to the traditional calling to song in Croatian culture. It also mimics the nature of Kolo music. Some of the words are, “Aijde” (let’s go), “Idemo” (we are going), “Dođi” (come), “Ne mogu” (I cannot). Both performers sometimes dance together and at other times alone, a symbolic ritual of caregiving through culture and dance.

The performance work, Maintaining Rhythm, is set around a black circle that is drawn on the ground. The mark symbolises the routine path. The path is set by tradition, keeping the structure and pace of the home going and keeping them safe from their past: nourishing their identity, their rituals, and their longing for their homeland. This work displays a ritual approach to maintaining identity, a home, culture, and family life. In the performance, the performers’ hands do not touch; instead, it is danced as an individual. The participants nevertheless work with each other to maintain the rhythm of the steps and the momentum of the circle. Both performers sometimes dance at the same time and at other times alone. I start off the performance by walking towards the circle. As my feet reach the circle, I start to perform the Kolo. As I make an entire loop of the circle, my aunty approaches the circle; as she starts the Kolo. There is no end nor beginning to this work. Caring in a relationship neither begins nor ends. It only ends in the final separation: death.