Alesha Mehta is a current doctoral student at the University of Auckland whose research engages with Vedic philosophies and ritual practice towards multiplicity in choreographic practice. Alesha’s research explores ritual as a choreographic method toward decolonising her personal performance practices to foreground her cultural heritage in her artistic practices. Her research interests reside within decolonisation, feminism, ritual, posthumanism and choreographic practice.
'Ritual as a method toward a decolonial choreographic practice'
"This paper will discuss the exploration of ritual as a choreographic tool to decolonize artistic practice through autoethnographic postgraduate research within a studio environment. The studio environment is one that is shaped through its own disciplines, where there may be a premise of rules and expectations (Dryburgh, 2018). The clean, sterile and neutral context of the studio could inform choreographic practices, as it could shape creative practice to bend to institutional rules (Ramirez & Christensen, 2013). This discussion considers, could the studio be decolonized through ritual practices? Ritual as a method of artistic practice is not simply an alternative way to express or create, but certain meanings, curiosities and desires can best or only be achieved in ritual (Rappaport, 1999). Through a sensorially active ritualistic practice we may begin to learn or unlearn our frameworks of understanding through symbolism which connects to wider issues in the world (Couldry, 2003). Saturating artistic practice with sensorial activations, ritual as a choreographic method may expand our knowledges and could unsettle how dance processes may be explored within creative practice and further, how decolonising artistic practice could unravel alternative ways to express and create."