The Oka Homma Singers’ soul-thumping drums and ringing voices resound in the distance along the Lakefront Trail. A canopy of pink blossoming trees showers petals on the audience as we sail down the path, pulled along by a current of wind and sound. Slow and easy, like swirling air, four figures float through the grove, reverently laying hands upon the bark and grass. They caress the breeze and mimic the shapes of the branches and trunks. Ayako Kato—kinetic philosopher, poet and choreographer—pauses to hang from one branch, arm hooked delicately and body unfolding toward the sky. The crowd is hushed.
“ETHOS IV: Degrowth/Cycle/Rebirth” is not simply a dance performance; it is an ambulatory journey that relies on community gathering and traveling, as well as spiritual engagement and prayer. Ayako Kato/Art Union Humanscape presented this work as part of the Dance Center of Columbia College’s Chicago Artist Spotlight Festival on Apr. 19 at 6 p.m. The series of events sprawls across the South Loop from the Grant Park Lakefront, through the Agora art installation and inside the Dance Center theater.
Ayako Kato during a performance of ETHOS II; Photo by Ricardo Adame
To further understand and embody a oneness with the natural elements, the community is invited to participate in multiple Indigenous American traditions, one being a water ceremony. With Lake Michigan dominating the horizon in lilting blue waves, Billie Warren, biologist and citizen of the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi, encourages the group to sing to the water. We call out over the grandiose lake, “I love you, water. I recognize you, water…”
However, within the Agora sculpture garden (a headless, armless forest of walking iron legs on the corner of Roosevelt Rd. and Michigan Ave.), we are returned to the chaos of city traffic. Here, Kato posits, “What is enough?” With each performative or ceremonial offering, the audience experiences a gradual shift from harmonization with the Earth to introspective reflection on the loss of body-nature connection within a bustling urban landscape.
Digging further into the question of how to find peace within societal chaos, Andy Slater—writer, performer and blind media artist—demonstrates how he perceives his environment through echolocation at the Dance Center theater. When the four movers encircle him, stomping and producing clicking sounds that swell into cacophony, Slater lets out a long, guttural, frustrated scream to quiet the noise.
Plastic pollution is introduced as an additional element of environmental disruption. Artist Carla Gruby (they/them) announces they are stepping into a “Wish-Cycle Center” in the corner of the stage, where they proceed to stuff plastic bags into their mouths. Coming from a peaceful, meditative hike through the lakefront, this is unsettling to watch. It is a harsh reminder of society’s unhealthy reliance on consumerist and capitalistic habits.
Photo by Sophie Allen
By the end, all these separate events build up to a profound solution to our despairing disconnect from the Earth: A cobweb of strings, which the performers call a “utopia,” are entwined across the stage and into the audience. Once everyone in the theater is tangled up in colored strands and grasping a common thread, Kato reminds us that to find our way back to Earth is to understand that “everything is connected.”
Although there were a multitude of moving parts and people, the journey was thoughtfully mapped out and executed with care. It was a collective discussion that relied on full body activation to communicate through complex questions, both verbally and nonverbally.
Ayako Kato/Art Union Humanscape’s “ETHOS IV: Degrowth/Cycle/Rebirth” was held on Friday, Apr. 19, at 6 p.m., and Saturday, Apr. 20, at 1:30 p.m., at the Dance Center of Columbia College (1306 S Michigan Ave), as well as surrounding Chicago Park District outdoor locations. For more information, please click the event link below or visit ayakokatodance.com.
