Tåno' Uchan | Dakota Camacho

mali'e | tåno' uchan |

A 5 minute Distillation of the piece presented at Forterra's Ampersand Live 2019

MALI'E | Tåno' Uchan | arrives upon your shores as an evening length solo (with option to include local community as an ensemble) in which a seafaring (and/or extraterrestrial) Navigator unfolds a universe from within their bag.

The Navigator journeys through their own family history, dancing rituals of respect and reciprocity with the territories and cultures of Oceanic, Black, & Native Turtle Island communities that have guided their canoe back home, despite the colonial lie that home/culture has been lost. As an Indigenous Pacific Islander, Camacho uses an auto-ethnographic lens to choreograph a spiritual grounded, yet critical, ceremonial response to ongoing colonization, displacement, and attempted genocide.

Creation stories work as allegories for how the diasporic navigate violence displacementlike seafarers wayfind through storms and endless oceans. MALI’E | Tåno’ Uchan functions as a ritual empowerment for the seafarer navigating the rek/newal of indigenous well-being amidst state-sponsored drug trafficking, militarized borders, private prisons, land and cultural dispossession. Camacho explores the creative potential of Matao language, chant, and dance on a journey towards ethical ways of being with Oceanic, Black, and Native Turtle Island movement and song traditions.

The work also features sound design by fellow Matao/CHamoru artist Micah Manaitai who produced two new singles for Dakota while they collaboratively composed the score.

Photography: Naomi Ishisaka

The work premiered at Northwest New Works at On the Boards in 2019 and was also presented at the 32nd Annual Weesageechak Begins to Dance Festival in T:karon'to (Toronto, Canada) with support from a 2019 Artist Trust GAP Award, and at the Tribal Gathering in Panama.

Tåno' Uchan was also presented as a work-in-progress at Skidmore College, at Indigenous Now! event at Tongva Park in Tongva Territory/Santa Monica with support from Dancing Earth. Tåno' Uchan was also presented as a distillation at the Forterra's Ampersand Live 2019, and Pridefest 2020.