Lerna Babikyan (she/her) is a dancer, trainer, writer and lecturer who holds BA degrees in Adult Education, and Modern Dance; she completed her MA on Movement, Mind and Ecology at Schumacher College.
Her unquiet state to the effects of ongoing destructive colonial systems to all living beings has been a long-term motivation to evoke the change starting from art experiences and pedagogic systems. As an artist she is utilizing the tools of art making such as; deconstruction, imagination, experimentalism, narration and playfulness that audience/learners can gain back their self & holistic awareness, authentic expression, creativity, autonomy, empathy and self-confidence. By minding today’s ethic, ecologic, educational and aesthetic needs; she is making dance pieces, designing creative dance and somatic based learning programs for all ages with the purpose of holistic learning and inclusive living with the feeling of kinship in the universe.
She strongly believes in the transformative role of the dance art, power of the connection and dialogue. Accordingly, she is offering land-based, ecosomatic, urban art experiences and participatory performances.
Bibliography:
- Harrison, M. (2021). The stubborn light of things. Faber & Faber.
- Lerman, L. et al. (2022) ‘Learning a City, Resisting Erasure: CRP in Community and Collaborative Process’, Akinbolbola, B., Meador.C in Critique is creative: The critical response process in theory and action. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.
- Lakoff, G. (2012). Explaining Embodied Cognition Results. Topics in Cognitive Science, vol. 4,
- Sletto, B. I. (2009). We Drew What We Imagined: Participatory Mapping, Performance, and the Arts of Landscape Making. Current Anthropology, vol. 50, no: 4
- Cartographic Echoes, Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrA5t7UL1-k&t=20s
- documenting the process: https://youtu.be/TWGDCon2ltg