Episode 67 – What the Dance Holds (The Brutal Joy)

Gabrielle Martin: Hello and welcome to Push Play, a Push Festival podcast featuring conversations with artists who are pushing boundaries and playing with form. I’m Gabrielle Martin, Push’s artistic director, and today’s episode highlights fugitive choreography, making things with folks you love, and hiding the circle in the line.

I’m speaking with Justine A. Chambers, choreographer of and a performer in The Brutal Joy, which is being presented at the Push Festival February 5th and 6th, 2026. The Brutal Joy merges Black vernacular line dance, sartorial gesture, and scored improvisation into an exploration of self-determination and collective imagination.

Through rhythm, light, and communal presence, the performers embody the poise of the Black dandy and the shared pulse of the electric slide. This is movement as memory and possibility, a choreography of Black living that imagines otherwise. Justine A. Chambers is a dance artist and educator. Her practice is a collaboration with her Black matrilineal heritage and extends from this continuum and its entanglements with Western contemporary dance and visual arts practices.

Her research attends to embodied archives, social choreographies, and choreography and dance as otherwise ways of being in relation. Here is my conversation with Justine.

Um, I am here on the unceded traditional and ancestral lands of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations, and that these are living territories with histories and futures held through movement, relation, and care. And we’re speaking about The Brutal Joy today, a work rooted in Black embodiment and sovereignty, and I’m recognizing the distinct sovereignties of these lands and the shared urgencies of decolonial practice, presence, and repair.

And Justine, where are you today? 

Justine A. Chambers: I am also, um, with you , uh, virtually, but also quite concretely on the territories of the Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam people. Um, and I really love how you acknowledge these ongoing, um, past, present, and future embodied practices, um, that most of us, um, can take for granted, and yet the people whose lands this belong to cannot.

And I’m just so grateful, um, for their stewardship so we can be here doing this thing we do. 

Gabrielle Martin: This thing we do, which is many things, but today we’re gonna talk about the thing that is The Brutal Joy. So in The Brutal Joy, Black vernacular line dance and sartorial gesture are treated not as quotation, but as knowledge systems, living archives of self-determination.

How did you arrive at this, uh, way of thinking about social dance and style as intellectual and political discourse? 

Justine A. Chambers: Um, yeah, I’ll, I’ll break it into two chunks. I’ll start with the dandy. Um, uh, I mean, I think first and foremost, I come from a family of dandies, even though maybe we didn’t articulate ourselves that way.

I have a very fashion-noble, fashion-forward, fashion-first family, um, on both sides of my family, like both the Black side and the white side. But of course, um, perhaps stylistically, I’ve always identified a little bit more, um, with m- with my matrilineal line, um- And but how I… So there’s that, which is just, like, a foundational thing that I don’t think was hyper-conscious, uh, until a bit later.

Um, in, uh, in tw- I work on this, I made this work with my friend Laurie Young called 100 More, and in 2017 when we were at that point where we were like, “What are we gonna wear?” Like, “What are these costumes and what does it look like?” And then somehow we ended up at looking at all these images of Black dandies.

Um, and then I was like, “Right, our costumes can’t be costumes. They have to be clothing. They have to be things we would wear and things that make us feel fly, basically.” Like, we have to feel like we look gorgeous and powerful. Um, we have to feel that power through the garments, because I feel like this is something clothing has always, always done for me.

Um, so and this was the beginning of me thinking really about how clothes operate in my life. Um, and not just as an aesthetic value, uh, a visual aesthetic, but maybe as, um, something that allows me to move through the world. Uh, and so that… And then you start thinking about, like, “How do I present myself in everyday life and what do I wear when I’m meeting this moment or that moment?”

Or, “Who am I in this space and what clothing allows me?” And then realizing that my wardrobe, which is enormous of course, as we all know, if you know me, um, has, like, so many different kinds of clothing in it. And of course I relate this to things around code switching and who I am in different spaces, but also just the fact that, like, I love garments, I love textiles, I love jewelry.

I d- Like, you know, some people are like, “I have a shoe problem.” Like, I have a everything problem, and I feel great about that problem. I have no problem with it. But I think what this sort of thought bubble that started with Laurie, that as I moved into this, this thing that I call the heirloom suite, which I’ll unpack a little bit later maybe, um, is like, “Oh, wow,” like, not everyone thinks this much about how they present.

And of course, I think this way n- in a num- for a number of reasons, you know, I don’t… I think about it as a way to maintain dignity, safety, and status, right? Um, how do we be taken seriously? How are we not in harm’s way? Um, also, I think about how, you know, I think about this in relation to acceptability politics, like when do you need to disappear?

When do you need to be invisible? And then what makes you hyper-visible, right? Um, uh, things that you have control over and things that you don’t have control over that make you hyper-visible. And so then eventually I got to this one book called Dandelion by Shauntrel P. Lewis, which is, like, just this beautiful sort of pho- photojournalistic book that just has pictures of dandies and many gender expressions and forms.

Um, and then that book took me to A Slave to Fashion, which was that Monica L. Miller, right, who now is, like, the queen of Superfine, uh, the show at The Met, which was she was als- the curator of the show at The Met and also her book was the inspiration for this Met Gala that just went by. Um, and then I started thinking about, like, the politics of dress and my family and how clothing allows us to step into versions of ourself that are rarely supported by the world.

Um, and I think clothing asks me, I won’t speak for all Black folks everywhere, but it makes me ask the question, like, what if? Like, what if I was this person? And what if, you know? So I think there’s, like, this real opening, uh, clothing is like a, is an opening and it’s political, as we know. Like, we think about, I think about fashion, Black fashion, and how it’s denigrated in one moment in history and then 10 years later, Balenciaga has it on the runway, right?

So I I’m always like, “Oh, you said we were ghetto, and now it’s high fashion.” So I’m always, like, thinking about sort of the power of perseverance, of claiming culture, of defining fult- culture, and creating a culture that is always, um, redefining itself, but not by getting rid of the past or, or denouncing the past or rejecting a past, but always bringing it through and with itself.

So I think that’s where, like, I started to say, “Oh, clothing isn’t about what you look like, it’s about what it allows for.” For some of us, not everybody, but for me, for very, very much, and I see that in my mother, I saw that in my grandmother, my great-grandmother. I mean, my great-grandmother wore a yellow feathered dress to my sister’s wedding.

Like, talk about pulling focus, right? So I just think the sort of, like, the beautiful audacity, um, is something that, like, really calls to me and how actually you need to be audacious if you’re gonna be erased, right? Like, you ha- if people are gonna try and erase you, there is a, a, like being, having audacity, being audacious, um, is, like, yet another mechanism for, mm, placing yourself firmly somewhere.

And then the social dance thing comes from… It started with, uh, so this, the Brutal Joy is, like, part of a series of four, possibly five works. I, I work really slowly and really iteratively, so I start with an idea and I unpack it this way, and then that opens up another portal, and then I do another work that’s around that portal.

And so this is, I feel like maybe, maybe Brutal Joy brings all of the things together a bit. But I made a work with my grandmother in 2018 called Tail- Tail Feather, um, which was for the Nanaimo Art Gallery, and it was about intergenerational practice. And so I asked my grandmother if she would work on this work with me, and that I wanted to make a work about her dancing.

Um, in the, like, ’40s, ’50s, and ’60s, she sort of went dancing every weekend at this place called the Bronzeville Ballroom, which is, like, a real, um, iconic historic site on the South Side of Chicago, um, where, like, all the jazz greats performed. But every Friday there would be dancing. Um, and I was like, I wanted to find out, I wanted to make her dances without ever seeing them, and I wanted it to be, uh, a conversation of her describing the dances.

Um, and I was gonna try and recreate them, um, as I, as I was hearing them and as she was describing them, sort of as, like, another… As an archival process, like an imperfect archival process, but that’s based in, like, relation and relating and, and loving each other. Like, essentially, just, like, ’cause we love each other.

‘Cause my grandmother, uh, really made me feel like a unicorn my whole life. Like, I felt like a unicorn. I did not feel like a unicorn in most places, but with my grandmother, I… Yeah, I kinda felt like I, you know, pooped rainbows or something. Like, I, uh… She made me feel very, very, very special and exquisite, actually.

Mm. So we started this very arduous process of me being on the phone with her for hours trying to get her to describe the dances, but she didn’t wanna do it. She just wanted to talk about the gossip and what was happening, what my aunties were doing, what her best friend was doing. So it took a long time, and I started to say, “Okay, I’m gonna pull from memory.”

So essentially, I pulled from memory some of the things she said. A- And the… It was meant to be a social practice thing where I would do these workshops where I would teach people this, the, my grandmother’s dances. But it seemed like the easiest form… And which I really m- model after, or it’s a quotation or a nod to Adrienne Piper’s funk lessons.

Um, I was like, “I’m gonna make a line dance ’cause they’re easy.” So it’s not about teaching intricate choreography. It’s about, like, bringing it down to, like, a basic walking structure, um, and then inserting gesture when people have capacity. Um, so that was the beginning of that. Then the second version of this work is called Archives and Heirlooms, which was prompted by Seka Boye when she said, did that, uh, Dancing Black in Canada: It’s About Time, and she asked me to make a response to her exhibition, which is very much an archival exhibition, right?

Just looking at all the dance archives of, like, Black dancers, uh, in Canada, primarily in ballet and modern dance. But, you know, my… This was… Uh, you know, which, which is my foundation, right? This is… You know, I didn’t grow up doing hip hop. Like, I was… I did all the formal Western training, for sure. Um, and so in this work, I talked through my dance history as a dancer, not a choreographer, just all the different dances I’d done.

And as I spoke, I tried to do the things I was talking about. It was this, like, incredibly strange adrenalized performance- … um, that I had sort of ended up making the day before ’cause I’d made another thing, and then I hated it, and then I scrapped it. And I was like, “Can we just write the score? I’m gonna just try and do this thing.”

And then as I was making that, I said, “Okay, the last thing I’m gonna do is the electric slide,” because that’s a dance from my childhood. And then it was… As I was performing, I was like, “Oh, this is my formative dance. It’s not ballet, and it’s not modern, and it’s not jazz, and it’s not contemporary. This is the first piece of choreography I ever learned.”

Mm. And so I was like, “Ooh, I gotta go into that. Now I gotta go into the electric slide.” Um, and what I found working on it, which for another work, which was just Heirloom, which was… I did at Concordia at the gallery there, um, was that, oh, this dance… So I reverse engineered the previous work where all I did was the electric slide for an hour.

But I tried to remember every choreography I’d ever done, but only do it within the structure of the electric slide. So I always did the four steps to the right, to the left, four back. Like, I did that structure, but I tried to, like, completely, completely change and form my body to do, like, the Paquita variations.

What’s the… Like, what’s the tone and the s- sense in my body when I’m doing Paquita variations, or 605, or Desrosier, or Diavolo? Like, I tried to, like- Mm … stay inside that form. And then I went, “Oh my God, the capaciousness of this walking structure allows for anything to emerge.” Like, anything can be done inside the electric slide, and you can just do the electric slide.

Like, you can just walk it, right? So that was sort of when I realized, oh, the dance holds all that you are if you want it to, it could hold. Or it could hold anything you’ve never tried to be yet, you know? Um, and then I was thinking back to, like, family gatherings, and cookouts, and basement of the bowling alley, and, like, all of these experiences I had with my mom, m- my mother’s side of the family, where, you know, I watched my, my Uncle Buddy do it with, like, little teeny-tiny steps ’cause he’s old, you know?

And then my cousin, who was, like, more nimble, would, like, slap the floor instead of doing a toe touch, and, like, another cousin would try and do a back flip inside the time. And so I was just like, “Oh- this dance allows you to sort of actualize yourself, but is also, like, open to constant change. Um, and then of course, when I started to do more scholarly research, I was, like, looking at the formation of line dance over time and how it started in the plantations, and it was about hiding the circle dances that were kind of not allowed because they scared plantation owners.

So they borrowed the forms of, like, um, quadrilles and minuets as line dances, and then stuck their dancing, the circle… They hid the circle in the line. Mm. So I feel like- Wow … this formation of, of line dance was a way to sort of, like, hold onto ourselves. Um, and then, like, all these codes and modes of, like, sociality and daily living and, uh, ritual were all stuck inside a line dance because it was an acceptable dance, right?

But then the wild thing is then, like, the, the, the white plantation owners would watch them do these dances and then steal them, and then go do them in their houses. And then the bondsmen would watch those dances and be like, “Okay, now what are we gonna do?” And I feel like this is how dance has worked in the United States of America forever, and maybe how Black culture has always existed, you know?

Like, the formation of America is Black culture. I will say that boldly, um, and I feel great about it. Uh- … so even this relationship has been going on for 400 years through dance, and then of course, through, through the clothing. And then this idea then once I started looking at that, I was like, oh my goodness, these are intertwining practices that, like, intersect, overlap, run parallel, and have all, both the clothing and the dancing are about se- self-actualization.

But not as an individuated experience always. Sorry, I hate this AI with the thumbs up. Sorry. But always as, um

Something that you have to do like within community and within yourself simultaneously. Um, so they just seemed like these like really radical methods, uh, that are like f- freedom technologies there for us. Like, they’re just sitting there for us. And when I was doing my thesis, uh, ’cause I did, worked on this for my, my MFA thesis, you know, I got asked to like say, you know, “But what’s your methodology?”

I’m like, “That’s the methodology.” “Oh, but how would you say it in your own words?” I’m like, “I don’t need to.” Like, it’s, it exists. It’s just there. Like, we don’t need to reinvent wheels, and I think of this as like a very interesting comment on the formation of the empire, how like colonial empires is that everything has to be like, mm, or the lack of acknowledgement that existing forms are what hold us, not these like breakthroughs, and the breakthroughs are always on the backs of existing forms.

Mm. As opposed to being an original or the one and only or a lone wolf. Yeah. Because nothing happens outside of, of relation. Nothing. Nothing. So this idea that you did it on your own, I w- saw this funny thing about this woman talking about how Matthew McConaughey had to go off and, you know, take a solo mission to like find himself to write his book, and she was like, “So who took care of your kids, man?”

Right? It’s like this was not a solo mission because somebody was there supporting you to go do this, and I think in my, in my Black community, in my family, um, there is no single anything. We are all doing this together. We have always done this. Somebody is, you are, we are always in this act of support, right?

Um, as a lifting each other up, but sometimes just survival. Um, that’s a very long-winded answer. 

Gabrielle Martin: It’s… I could just keep listening because there’s so much there. You know? It’s like, you’re just bringing us into the depths of your research on this, um, and it’s really, really fascinating, and there’s so many…

Yeah, yeah, I’m here for it. Um- I’m just looking at my next questions and I’m like, “Well, you’ve really spoken to that beautifully.” You know, you basically, I, I feel like you’ve just really clearly des- described how this work is an anti-colonial imagining, uh, where dance performance and embodiment operate as both epistemology and ontology, um, ways of knowing and being.

And what, um, and what kinds of knowing and being become possible through the act of dancing itself. Like, I feel like you’ve just kind of beautifully spoken to that. Um, is there anything else that you would speak to with regard to an articulation of bodily sovereignty? So this is something, also a term you’ve used with regard to the work, um, specifically around the figure of the Black dandy.

Um- Yeah. And, and is there something that you would maybe wanna speak to a bit more about, um, yeah, an agent of reworlding, the, the dandy as an agent of reworlding? 

Justine A. Chambers: Yeah. I mean, I think, I think the dandy is, is, um, sort of at once, um, like, a social, um… Like, you know, I think about them like the raven, you know?

Like, like, not quite a trickster, but definitely, like, a shit disturber, while maintaining total composure, right? So there’s this thing is that, you know, it doesn’t matter if you’re, like, a, you know, a Brooks Brothers dandy or a sweatsuit dandy or whatever it is, but, like, there’s a kind of composure that also configures your body, right?

Like, I know that, you know, today I’m wearing, like, a football jersey and, like, camo overalls, but I’m also wearing a cuff link around my neck, right? So I think there’s this thing where it’s like, that makes my body do a certain thing when I’m wearing… ‘Cause I’m not sporty at all. I just like sportswear.

Like, this is so fake. It’s so fake. It’s all this… But I like those materials. Um, that configures my body one way and then, you know, when I decide to put on a blazer or trousers versus overalls, that configures my body another way. Mm-hmm. And I think the dandies are sort of the masters of how our, of how to reconfigure our bodies, um- In terms of being hyper-visible, um, you’re hyper-visible anyways if you’re not white, more visible if you’re Black, uh, even more hyper-visible if you’re Black.

But what is it to, to sort of, um, clap back or, or speak back, um, by there actually being nothing to criticize there except for your sheer presence, and then this sort of, this sort of beautiful articulation of texture and, and, um, detail? Like, I mean, for me, the dandy’s all about detail, that the closer you look- Mm-hmm

the more depth of expression is there, or the more nods to histories, to pasts, to, like, potential futures i- is, like, sort of all… Not even hidden, it’s just layered, right, inside of their bodies. Mm-hmm. Um, I also think of both these dances, this dancing, this dance I’ve made, this dancing, this clothing, these clothes that I wear, and the clothes that I wear in the show is, like, a form of, um, citation.

Like, what if citation didn’t have to be at the, a bibliography at the back of the book or a footnote? Um, but what if, if… You know, because citation Frames and affirms, right? And it points to method. That’s what citation is there for. Mm-hmm. And I think I really borrowed that from Katherine McKittrick. So the difference between citation, I think, maybe inside of an academic context or in a book context is kind of like prove what you know.

Gabrielle Martin: Mm-hmm. 

Justine A. Chambers: Center your knowingness. But then I was like, what if we even sort of, like, turn citation a little bit on an angle and use it as a way to share how we know imperfectly and practically and in relation to, like, a broad swath of other people so that it’s not just about situating what I know, but I know because, and I know because of whom, and, um, and I’m still figuring out the knowing, you know, as this sort of ellipsis.

Um, and I think this idea of a citation that isn’t, um, spelled out but danced out, dressed out, dressed and redressed, sang out, orated, whatever it is, as opposed to being something that can be captured, 

Gabrielle Martin: um- Mm-hmm. Speaking to non-Western epistemologies. Like, yeah … 

Justine A. Chambers: like, what if you couldn’t hold onto it? What if you couldn’t put it under a microscope, right?

Um, and that’s, you know, yeah, so many things about that unto itself and that, you know, like, what if these… ‘Cause it’s about centering embodied knowledge, right? And that occurs at the dinner table, and at social events, and walking down the street, and, uh, picking out, you know, the underwear that no one’s gonna see that matches your shirt, right?

Like, whatever it is, right? And, and I feel like it’s a referential conversation, so I mean, citation, of course, is reference, so it’s a referential conversation, but what if that’s an embodied conversation instead of, um, a scripted or captured conversation? Um, because if it’s referential, then you’re in relation, and then it’s never just you according to you or the world according to Garp, right?

Like, it’s just, it’s, it’s, it’s in the meeting between things. Um, and I mean, of course the dandy, like, the clothes, I mean, if we think about, you know, post-emancipation, being able to pick your own clothes was the greatest freedom, right? All of a sudden, no one could tell you what to wear. I mean, they could try, and certainly did, and there’s all of that being uppity and beyond your status and all of this kind of thing.

Um, but what happened very quickly is that Black folks embellished. And, um, I mean, some of the first seamstresses, like, you know, Martha Washington’s seamstress was a Black woman. Like, let’s talk about that. She had some fabulous dresses, right? So I think there’s just something about, um, the insistence upon beauty not being frivolous, trite, but actually being how we survive, right?

Um, I’m really all over the place, but I- I’m just trying to pull it all together. Um- That embedded in the will to adorn, which I think is a Saidiya Hartman, uh, quote that I’m probably ruining, um, and the love of too much, um, we invite another way of being and of knowing, uh, as opposed As opposed to just doing what’s already there.

Like, I feel like Black folks do what’s already there and plus, plus, plus. Um, because we need the plus, plus, plus to make it in the room. Let’s be clear, you know? Um, yeah. And that our appearance isn’t a vanity. Um, I mean, sure, we’re all vain. All humans are vain. That’s fine. But it’s not about a vanity. It’s about a presentation of maybe, um, a way of being and a way of knowing, I think, or I’m still thinking that through always.

Maybe Yeah. 

Gabrielle Martin: Thank you for bringing us into the depth of the thought behind this work, that this work is one, one iteration, as you’ve shared, of like many, many projects that, um, realize and, and communicate these ideas. Uh, I would love to talk a little bit more about the form of The Brutal Joy. So it unfolds as a scored improvisation between dance, sound, and light- Mm-hmm

with each performer shaping and being shaped by the others. Can you talk about this call and response structure and how it reimagines collaboration as a site of listening and opacity? 

Justine A. Chambers: Ooh, I love that question. Yeah. I mean, I knew that I didn’t wanna do a solo. I mean, of course everyone’s like, “Your solo.”

I’m like, “Not a solo, not a solo.” Because like I was saying before, like, everything in relation and, uh, we are nothing without our relations, quite, quite, um, concretely in, in my experience or in my life. So I wanted to make something with folks. Uh, I needed to make something with folks that I love and that know me.

Um, but I didn’t… I, I… You know, when I teach, I’d always tell my students, “When you’re in class, you know, like, take space and make space, a simultaneous acts.” And, and I think about… I was like, “How could we do this across several different disciplines or different forms or medium, like media? Like, what is it to let the light dance, um, to let my body sound?”

Like, you know, what if we were all everything, you know? And so we worked with, like, two sort of larger overarching, um, struct- ways of, ways of being maybe that I, that I really take from, from being in Black community and being inside of these dances in Black community or even, like, being at church, you know?

Like, I mean, you know, Black Pentecostal and Baptist Churches, it’s lively, lively. Um, but this idea of, like, ritualization and individuation. So ritualization, just to be a nerd, is, like, how whatever sort of collective configurations are at a ritual event, whether that’s church, that’s dance, that’s a concert, whatever the hell it is, cookout, Juneteenth pub.

Um, and then individuation is how in the presence of others, you, you express flair or, um- you riff in your own self. But the point, what I love about this definition of individuation, it’s not you alone on a stage, it’s always you in the company of others. So I really was like, “Okay, these are the things we’re working on.

We’re working on our collective configurations and also our individual expression, but only held in the gaze and the care of others.” So th- those were sort of larger structures. And you brought up opacity, which of course brings Glissant into the room, and I love that he always says, like he says this thing in Poetics of Relation where he says that we should focus on the texture of the weave and not its component parts, like not the nature of its components.

So I was like, how can we weave this thing together where everything is necessary and the only way we know is that because we’re all here? Like, each thing… I can’t even rehearse it by myself, to be perfectly honest. When I try, it’s a disaster. I’m like, I don’t even know who I am or where I am without Mao or James with me.

Like it’s really like, I try, but, you know, I give up real quick ’cause I’m like, I don’t know what to do without knowing where they are or how they’re holding me or any of it. Like, it is so dependent on our togetherness, um So it’s also about the sort of… So there’s that, and then from under- underneath of that, the subscores underneath of that are working with vamp, riff, and break, which are total things we t- I steal from jazz music, which part of this work was sort of inspired from going to this jazz club with my grandmother when I was a kid in the ’80s that was, like, in a basement and dark, and everyone was smoking, and, like, which, you know, that’s how you know it was the ’80s.

And, um, like, nothing in the room felt separate from each other, and that, like, the smoke caught in the shards of light was no different than the clinking of glasses, like ice in glasses, which is no different from the, the, the rhythms being created with the drums and the squall of the… Like, I was just like, it was so sublime, like, in the most, uh, like, its def- definition of being both, like, sort of terror, extreme terror, and extreme beauty, like, all at once.

Um, so I was like, “Oh, yeah, the vamp, the riff, and the break,” right? The vamp… So there’s always… We’re all always doing one of those things, and we’re just trying to listen closely enough to determine what is happening. So the vamp kind of holds it down, right? Like, if you think about, um, Stevie Wonder’s Superstition, that song, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.

Like, that, just that riff, that vamp just goes through the whole song. Dee, da, da, da, dun, dun. And it just goes through, right? It never changes. But then on top of that, the vocals do a thing. The horns do a thing. The drums do a thing. And then riffing is just, like, a variation on the vamp, right? Like, you let the vamp…

Like, you don’t go too far from the vamp, but you’re like, “Here I am doing my own little version,” right? And so James riffs, Mal riffs, I riff, and then, like, the ultimate, the penultimate, the ultimate thing is to make way for the break, and the break is not something that you can script. You just hope you get to a place where something opens inside of yourself, and whether, uh, uh, ourselves, whoever it may be, whoever breaks, like, any of us can break, and it becomes this sort of, like, fugitive choreography that you can’t, you can’t control.

But you can’t pop off either, right? You have to stay tethered to the vamp, which is staying tethered to each other. So I think we’re sort of, like, working these ideas. Um, there’s an overall structure. You know, like, I come in the room. They’re already there. Like, there’s that. We know I’m gonna hang out with my costume for a while.

We know I’m gonna, you know, work with postures. Like, we know there’s, like, a sequence of general ideas. Um, but there have been times where that sequence doesn’t fully emerge, or it, like, just takes a hard right or left somewhere else. But what’s always been so amazing is that it never falls apart, um, because we care for it not to, right?

Um, and, uh, yeah, and, and we kinda like… It’s just this thing about being able to share and knowing that sharing doesn’t always mean equal Like in this show, maybe I took more space, and the next show maybe Mal, but it doesn’t matter because it’s like reciprocity over time. Um, and, and we just really work really hard not to deconstruct the ideas, because I think that’s a form of erasure too.

Mm-hmm. I don’t wanna be abstract. Sure, it may read as abstract, but it’s all very practical stuff I’m doing. I’m not making anything, um, that doesn’t exist already. Like, maybe it’s sh- showing up in my body different ways, or it’s showing up in the sound in different ways, or it’s showing up in the light. Um, but it’s really important to us that it’s not about, like unpacking, unpicking, laying bare.

Like, there’s things that are not legible in the work, and like, I’m just like, “Yeah, you can’t have everything.” Katherine McKittrick says this amazing thing where she says, “Stop her autopsy.” And I’m like, yeah, just like be okay with the whole- Mm … and be okay with not understanding. And what does that lack of s- understanding allow for inside of your own sort of gauge of yourself?

Um, and I also think that listening and the act of noticing are like radical acts of empathy, and if we just notice things more, people more, then perhaps we would have a different understanding of suffering or difficulty. Um, maybe we could define care in a bunch of different ways that aren’t all around going to a yoga retreat, yoga retreat.

You know, like maybe we could… You know, I just always think about the power of noticing and, and, or noticing in myself when someone notices a small detail about my mo- my m- me in that moment, how that like opens me so fully to them, ’cause I’m like, “Oh, you saw that?” You know? Mm-hmm. And I think we all… I mean, you know, even my kids, like, “I just wanna be seen.”

I’m like, “Okay.” 

Gabrielle Martin: Mm-hmm. 

Justine A. Chambers: You know? Like, we all just wanna be seen. But also within the confines of the work or within the structure of the work, I think it’s an impera- like, it’s really a, a choreographic performance imperative, is that we see, feel, notice each other as, as a, like, really, um, rigorous act. Not a task, because it’s not a hard task to do.

I mean, sometimes it’s hard to negotiate what’s happening in the moment, but that’s also super exciting, uh, as a performer. 

Gabrielle Martin: Uh, speaking of exciting, I am so excited to be in the room with this work. Genuinely. Aw. You know, just hearing you talk about it, I, yeah, I’m really excited to be there and to experience it.

And I imagine our audience is too, so thank you so much for the generosity of bringing us into the world of this work and, and how it sits within your wider research- 

Justine A. Chambers: Oh, truly. Thank 

Gabrielle Martin: you for the- … and life. 

Justine A. Chambers: Yes, thank you for the chat. It’s always… Actually, I have to… I’m writing about it again right now, so this is beautiful timing to talk to you ’cause it kind of reignites, and some new things showed up, right?

Like, uh, make space, take space. You, in our relation, in our conversation, new thoughts emerged, and this is the beauty of being with other people