Anna-Mari Laulumaa
The characteristic of performing arts is that it lives in the moment, or really for a moment — and disappears. Like in human life, it is an intended or miraculous coincidence, but always only temporary. In the age of digitalization, the performing arts remind us of the basic nature of life: it is limited despite humanity’s efforts to postpone death. We eventually live on earth in the memories of others and in the documents we leave behind. This is also the case for the performing arts. It lives on as an experience and in the photos and video clips taken of it.
I look at the photos and videos of the past performance in a gentle wonder: How in the world did it become just that? And how great it was. And I feel some sort of beautiful sadness. The performance never happens again.
The sadness goes away through the mind’s automatic balancing system. Fun moments from the rehearsals come back to my mind. I suddenly see a flash from the flamenco studio backyard, where we tested the hands around the trees. I look at the videos taken from the rehearsals as looking at my own child’s first steps. In it, the scene takes its first steps, then begins to walk, and soon it runs.
The next glimpse is from rehearsals where we were testing the walking lines with Joel Linna and Markus Kinnunen in the swamp. It poured rain and water spilled from my neck to my back despite the hood. There’s not much more in the video than the unbridled crackling of the rain. After two hours of training, I was quite wet. As we left, Joel said with a smile, ”Oh, this is sooo nice!” There was not a splash of sarcasm in the sentence. That was quite true and illustrates the attitude of both Joel and Markus. That sentence also sums up the deepest nature of the whole project. They felt joyous despite of walking and singing in the swamp in the rain, a huge stone on the shoulders. Roughness and true challenging of ourselves were part of the enjoyment.
The goal of this performance was twofold from the beginning. It had to be good art as well as part of the research. The theory of the relationship with nature was discussed during the spring with Kaisa and Riikka during the planning stages and well before the intensive implementation phase of the summer. Working together in person was not possible due to covid so we talked a lot on the phone. The two of us discussed and reflected, sometimes for hours, reflecting on our own relationship with nature and theory. Thoughts revolved wildly from place-specificness through the old Finnish legends to nature conservation, from the meanings of words through experientialism to our borders. This grinding phase was absolutely crucial. In it, the subconscious accumulated material for processing.
The performance thus had two aims; to be an independent artwork and produce information about the relationship with nature for the research. In the project application, it was defined as follows: ”The aim is to create a work in which the different forms of the relationship with nature and their multileveled complexities challenge viewers to explore their own experience and become aware of their thinking and beliefs.”
An independent artwork is easier to accomplish, but how is the performance built into the research? The answer is: by doing. Performing arts always require concrete deeds. We have to get to work and take action. But there is no rushing to do until you have addressed the theme on a personal level as well. That’s how I also think about good acting. The actor treats the theme in his mind so that the “mind desktop” is as clean as possible to function in the use of the character himself. In director work and especially in building a site-specific performance, it is much the same as in the process of writing and directing a performance. In both, my own perception and the way I make art is repeated in this very kind of personal immersion process that eventually gives rise to the work. Working on a personal issue means going through the slightly dull process of revealing your own relationship with nature to yourself. Maybe not completely, but more than before. The sad side of introspection is that you can’t find mere treasures inside
There were two essential moments in looking at my own relationship with nature. The first was my exaggeration at the bottom of the Hitonhauta as I tossed and quickly flashed the thought: “Why do these stones have to be here! This is annoying.” That thought was over a hundredth of a second, but I got it caught up like a passing bird. I looked at it in amazement. What on earth do I mean when I get annoyed by rocks on the ground? This is what it is about reflection and introspection: part of one’s own mind observes the experiential mind.
I’m thinking about the nature of the relationship as being somehow ”good”. I run and ski in the forests and I am very sensitive to many things. I spare meadow flowers in my backyard and mourn every tree felled from the yard. But is that surface just a delusion? Have I built myself an identity and a story of myself as some kind of natural person? Am I, after all, an urban, modern person for whom walking on a rock is annoying? Is it really the case that a 300-meter quarry already makes me miss a smoother and, in fact, man-made route? And of course there is nothing wrong with that longing. Man, like other animals, has built a functional environment for himself. But still. My thoughts kept confusing me.
Why did the rocks of the gorge start to irritate even though I specifically wanted to make a show here?
Another important moment was when I realized I wouldn’t dare to sleep in Hitonhauta for a night alone. At first I definitely wanted to experience the gorge alone one night. But my courage waned as the summer came closer. Sleeping in the gorge alone was no longer a fun idea. I realized that I had started to ran faster toward my car, as the twilight descended and bears began to appear on the blackened tree trunks. I realized that in nature I was not as at home as I had imagined. What should you think about it? Am I afraid of nature? What am I afraid of? And why? What are my instincts, my inheritance, my pastimes and what have I learned? Is my relationship with nature right or wrong? Good or bad? One of my old friends, who was considering coming to see the performance asked quite seriously: ”So can I come to see the performance even if my relationship with nature is kind of bad?” He did not eventually come even though I had said quite honestly, that I am interested in all kinds of relationships with nature. That exploring the relationship is truly inspiring and wonderful. Our relationship with nature is never as simple as good or bad.
The relationship with nature is like an underwater world, into which I dived and realized that there is more there than I could have ever imagined.
The relationship with nature began to appear to me as quite multidimensional, contradictory, and layered. The multidimensional and layered approach began to take shape as a performance: although each scene was built from a particular chosen location, I wanted enough levels and tones for each image. Instead of a flavor of a thin juice, I thought of the scenes as a multi-layered cognac or a good wine with multiple flavors on top of each other: that the scene opens layer by layer for each in its own way. Since the audience would be asked about the relationship with nature after the performance, I wanted the scenes to excite the audience to talk about their contradictions as well: to take an interest in the layering and surprise of the relationship with nature itself. The “correct answer expected by the teacher” familiar from the school had to be avoided by all means. I didn’t even have this one right answer, because exploring the relationship with nature suddenly felt the same as exploring other relationships. They are not inconsistent or clear. Sometimes I think there is something about our mother relationship in our relationship with nature. And maybe psychoanalysts think so? Among psychodrama practitioners, we have had the saying that everyone in their dramas eventually returns to think about their own motherhood at the kitchen table. Is the relationship with nature in the end a version of the mother-child relationship as well?
There were various pieces of the theory and reflections in the scenes of the performance. The images of national romance, the collapses of Linkola, industrialization and technological development, the utilization of nature, our existence, spirituality, our relationship to death, lifeless nature and the perspective of history, the struggle with nature and the security and comfort of nature. In the performance, the sad and depressed Linkola figure cries for the destruction of nature against the rot and the men are chanting carrying heavy stones on their shoulders in the swamp. Elsewhere, the water touches the hand incredibly powerfully as we sit on the ground and feel nature all around us, the hands of flamenco dancers touching the surface of the trees tenderly. The lumberjack swings at the top of the trees, reminding of human skills, abilities and responsibilities. The lumberjack is above us, is man there or in what relation to the rest of the living and inanimate? In the gorge a woman turns towards us slowly like the circle of life. The ice melts on the performers hands in a beautiful rockfield from the ice age. The time perspective opens from the ice age to the present moment and to the melting glaciers at the same time.
The entire performance route can also be seen in a picture of life or crisis. Partly unconsciously, I quite frantically wanted a show just for Hitonhauta and its difficult environment. Sufficiently challenging terrain, the sweat of the experience, the body, and bringing the audience far enough away from the nearest burger place seemed important for exploring the relationship with nature. When studying the relationship with nature, it is not just talked about, but it is experienced and experienced as thoroughly as it can now be done without the loss of the public. The performance says something about my own relationship with nature, where nature is harsh and powerful and ultimately never under human control.
The role of people in the face of the greatness of nature became quite clear on this stage. The sets were enormous.
The presentation, with its rides, eventually lasted more than three hours and, for those who participated in the study, more than four hours. As I transported the audience to the performances, I found myself telling the groups at the beginning like this: “Don’t worry at that worst point, the hardest quarry is just a hundred yards and then it makes it easier”. If the performance were a metaphor for a crisis or an awkward point in life, I would act differently than what happens in life. In the most awkward crises of life, it would be wonderful to hear those words: “One more hundred meters and then ease. Certainly.”
Thus, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the goal of relief has shifted many times. Maybe we’ll cope better when we put our hopes in a place where it’s easier. I am writing this in January 2021 and visited the ”Damn Tomb”; Hitonhauta, or Devil’s Grave, yesterday. In winter, when the snow covers the rocky areas, the passage is easier than in summer. The path is leveled. Nature makes it happen.
