Theo-artistic collaboration: Sparrows & Mystics

Exactly one year ago, Lotta Petronella and I had our first official collaboration, when I invited her to do a writing with plants workshop during our community writing retreat in the Archipelago Guest House residency here on Kökar.

Lotta and I met already in September 2023 when we were invited to do workshops at the Hiljaisuuden Sympoosi days in Helsinki. Once we were introduced to each other, we soon realised that we had many similar interests and a very rare thing in common: we both knew who Christina Mirabilis (c.1150 – 1224) was! In addition to that, we had both worked with the historic materials we have on Christina the Astonishing in our own ways, but had not yet published anything on the topic. From then on, we started meeting regularly to see what kind of collaborations we would want to make around Christina and our work with her.

As a first move, Lotta Petronella invited me to be part of a performance lecture related to her project Själö Herbarium. In her work with Själö Herbarium, Lotta Petronella has been tracing the untold stories of the women living on the island and combining that with the practices and knowledge stemming from plants and trees and the research currently done at the biological station. Lotta’s amazing work on Själö has materialised into a documentary film that you can watch here, and a radio essay in Swedish that you can still listen to. Together with Taru Elfving, they have also established the CAA Contemporary Art Archipelago, where they do transdisciplinary projects over a Long haul of time, working closely together with the researchers at the biological station.

Incorporating Christina Mirabilis into this work is a way to move even further back into time, and bring forth the fact that the important question to ask is not always what we can know about the past, but what knowledge did Christina have that we may need today? (Lotta Petronella 2024)

Today, I had the pleasure of meeting not only with Lotta Petronella but also her close collaborator: Gabriela Ariana, as we will be creating a piece together with the choir and performance artists for the DRIFTS festival in Helsinki on September 6th. It was quite amazing to hear how Gabriela’s ecosomatic work and the traditional healing practices she has inherited from her Chilean and Indigenous grandmother resonated with the Dominican prayer moves that I have been practising and the work on medieval dance practices that my research has centred on.

I look forward to sharing my knowledge and insights on prayer positions, embodiment and medieval mystics with all of you who come and see the performance! WELCOME!