reclaiming + celebrating women's initiations
Welcome to the House of Belonging
1 House. 27 Rooms.
A House of Ancestral Healing, Resilience & Belonging
Celebrating the Lives of Women of Color
I’m speechless.
I took the journey you offered me...
I cried and laughed and received so much.
I want to be there again and again, and for all my friends to experience this...
which is impossible to describe...
Power. Love. Intention. Magic. Women.
Bravo.”
- 20/20 Vision audience member
CLEAR SIGHT
Rites of Passage: 20/20 Vision was a multimedia "ritual house" honoring the lives & visionary legacies
of Black, Indigenous & Immigrant Women of Color in America (BIWOC),
set inside a historic former Women's Club in Western Massachusetts.
Throughout its 27 "Rooms of Cure", 20/20 Vision reclaimed women's experiences of initiation
using ritual theatre & multimedia art
shared over 10 live performances from August 13-17, 2021.
20/20 Vision was created in collaboration with 60 Women of Color artists ages 3 to 75,
and was witnessed by nearly 1000 audience members.
Together we created a living village of belonging and healing,
and embodied the liberated future we dream of.
I am honored to be reborn tonight.”
The abundance, voluptuous spirit of healing, self-hood, sisterhood- so generous, healed + healing OUR FUTURE + OUR PAST + OUR PRESENT.
Thank you each deeply for your Love.”
Taking in all the many rites in the house – I feel expanded + opened, like the world is fuller + filled with breath, song, rhythm + color.”
All of these things are our rites; all of these things- we already know;
all of these hold power and allow us to flow effortlessly through the unknown.”
Being held by the rich soils of women of color.
May a life of honoring them be born.”
WE ARE THE ONCE & FUTURE
VISION OF OUR ANCESTORS
Each room in 20/20 Vision
embodies a rite of passage theme
in the lives of
Black, Indigenous + Immigrant
Women of Color in America
Yet ultimately, it was
a living, breathing ritual
of Remembrance + healing justice
on behalf of all our lineages,
and all our many colors.
...that visibility which makes us most vulnerable is
that which also is the source of our greatest strength.”
– Audre Lorde
REIMAGINE INITIATION...
LINEAGE. SEEDS. SOVEREIGNTY. FERTILITY. SUSTENANCE.
MEDICINE. WATER. WOMB. FLOWER. VICTORY.
DIASPORA. STORY. WEAVE. LEGACY.
SOIL. ANCESTRAL SOUL. HEALING JUSTICE. REMEMBRANCE.
ROOMS of CURE
-
Soul Kitchen — rediscovering inter-generational community and nourishment
-
Wombman Heal Thyself— on the healing of women's bodies + water bodies
-
The Living Womb— revisioning pregnancy and birthing
-
The Nothing— a walk-in-closet about abortion, miscarriage and stillbirth
-
Migration/ Diaspora— honoring the immigrant experience
-
Legacy— healing inter-generational trauma, reconnecting with the earth
-
The Grief Room— a memorial for global diasporic lineages and the inter-generational grief of colonization and displacement
-
Loss/ A Pause— a closet honoring loss
-
Dissolution— a room about spiritual breakdown, breakthrough and rebirth
-
Forgiveness— on forgiving ourselves, our ancestors, our oppressors
-
Re-Matriation— re-matriating land, ecology and the sacred
-
V is for Victory— an altar-room to fertility and creative sovereignty
-
Sustenance— on rest and returning home to nature
-
The Sustenance Pantry