Zwoisy Mears-Clarke: Erste Schritte zu den Schwellen

In the organizer's words:

How do we leave the colonial space to which we have been accustomed for over five centuries? How can we cross the thresholds that lead from this space into different worlds?
First, we need to get closer to those thresholds, step by step.
Erste Schritte zu den Schwellen (English translation: First Steps Towards the Thresholds) offers a new folk dance. The performance has its lineage in German mask traditions and, of course, finds its home in public space. Yet Erste Schritte zu den Schwellen doesn't aim to drive away the winter but rather the local colonial structures. In a slow procession, masked figures dance rhythmically, wearing bells between their shoulder blades while they describe their movements (as a creative, integrated audio description) and telling stories in German, Spanish, and English. Every figure is a transmuter and a seducer, looking forward to gathering and dancing with you!
Together, audience and performers traverse the space of local colonial and decolonial perspectives. But who knows what might happen after the procession, later, closer to the thresholds - other than sharing and drinking tea and wishing to stay there a while?

Zwoisy Mears-Clarke is a choreographer of the encounter. Zwoisy uses the expanded potentiality of dance, audio description, poetry and storytelling to confront forms of systemic oppression, such as (neo)colonialism, racism, gender discrimination, and ableism, to open encounters that might otherwise seem unreachable.

Duration: approx. 30 min.

Note: The audio description and touch tour are integrated into the performance; no registration is required to access it.
A pick-up service from Düsseldorf Main Station (at DB Information) to the performance venue, during the performance, and back to the main station is available for blind and low-vision guests. If you would like to use this service, please send a brief email to kontakt.ersteschwellen@outlook.com. A detailed route description is also available below as a PDF and as MP3 files.
For visitors with mobility impairments, a route description and a map with information on wheelchair-friendly and mobility aid-friendly paths are also available below.

Price information:

Free entry