Nature is my Teacher
“Manifesting,“ New Waves Residency Barbados 2024, by Arnaldo James
by Emilie “Zila“ Jabouin
Folk dances have taught me a lot about the natural movements of the body. The way buds grow, flourish, and dry up. The way the ocean and waves ebb and flow in full release... slapping you, pulling you in and spitting you out if they so wish to; and the way the body exudes water, blood, feces, discharge. These are all cycles and all manifest in perfectly synchronized ways.
Cyclical patterns of a Yanvalou expression on the sand, L’Anse d’Azur Beach, Jérémie, Haïti, November 2024
That's why, when I teach a rhythm like Yanvalou, a water rhythm that manifests into body ondulation (emerging from the pelvis), hence, movements of water that mimic the cycles of life and living, I say that folk culture is scientific and naturally expresses itself perfectly and precisely in the body. I have proven this to be true over and over again, as I teach adults born on the African continent and others in Canada, the Caribbean and Latin America, or are descendants of these places; as I teach high school children of Asian background as well, or elders from all walks of life and from at least 5 different continents, the result is the same. Once they grasp the rhythm, the flow of the movement comes naturally, as though the drum, the echo of the most essential vibe is guiding their bodies exactly as it needs to move to regulate itself back to nature.
Emilie teaching, “Reconnecting with our Creative Center through Yanvalou” workshop, New Waves Residency, Barbados, July 2024 by Arnaldo James
Practicing folk culture, drumming, dancing, and singing (in my case from Haïti) is about being in perfect harmony with the self and our environments. It's about being fully in the body and being at peace.
This is why in my two creations, The Release, about interrupted pregnancies and Jérémie, au Coeur de ma vie, about Les Vêpres de Jérémie (1964) that deal with traumatic events, I lean into Yanvalou, a truly soothing rhythm of welcome, prayer, rebirth, and healing. In both works, the story starts with difficulty and unbalance to develop into finding a sense of solace or atonement and eclipsed joy within oneself, only possible through the act of cleansing.
Zila performing “Womb Secrets: the Ancestral Agreement,“ January 2023, dance Immersion Canadian showcase, by Dawit TIbebu
In the dance world, my creative process is called land-based research, or land-based creation--a practice of creating with and from the land and listening to it. Internally recognized Indigenous choreographer, potter, dance artist and chancellor Santee Smith teaches in her workshops led on her land in Six Nations, west of T’karonto (Toronto) to sit with the land, at the bottom of a tree trunk--root to root--or “vulva to the earth,” as she says. Once I abandon myself to this connection, overwhelming information is poured into me. Nature teaches, and nature speaks.
I have carried these teachings with me ever since, from Canada to Barbados to Haïti, while creating. Irma Villafuerte, a friend and colleague has also brought me onto her creative journey dancing through her own work of trauma and heavy histories in her homeland of El Salvador. To you both, I am very grateful for the ways you have shaped me into a very different and stronger dancer.
“Asé,” New Waves Residency, Barbados 2024, by Arnaldo James
And to nature, my greatest teacher, you will never leave me, as I come from water and earth, and will return to water and earth.
Asé. Ayibobo.
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N.B. My creative processes began with the undeniable and crucial support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council and dance Immersion.
* I’m fundraising! For more on my creative process and to support it, you can read more about it and contribute to my upcoming piece by following this link to my fundraiser.
