Becoming Rock: Fox Stones, Jítrava, Liberec Region, Czechia, developed as part of my ongoing Becoming Rock body of work. The work began during Bohemiae Rosa, a week-long Body Weather Work workshop led by Frank van de Ven and Miloš Šejn in the Lusatian and Zittau Mountains in August 2024. The international interdisciplinary open-air workshop brought artists and dancers together to explore relationships between body, art and landscape through Body–Site Exploration. The workshop involved physical and mental training, walking and journeying, different ways of experiencing body, movement and landscape, drawing and direct contact with the environment.
Working with a sandstone rock face at Jítrava, drawing became a way of getting closer to the rock through touch. I explored its surface by touch rather than sight, making a series of drawings as I felt its folds, crevices and contours. The sandstone reminded me of the folds of my mastectomy scar, and as I drew I gradually folded my body into the rock. I then repeated the movement without drawing. My eyes remained open as I physically recalled touching and drawing the rock. The movement was performed almost imperceptibly slowly and documented on film. Holding my body in a curved position required sustained muscular effort while the sandstone grazed my skin.
The resulting film brings together the landscape and this extremely slow movement. During editing, I superimposed the filmed landscape and moving image of my body so that the contours of body and rock became difficult to distinguish.
