"Tuscarora/Moon" is a performance rooted in the cyclical nature of existence where endings mirror beginnings. Anchored in the theme of reproduction, the work draws a conceptual circle, invoking the return of the sperm to its origin the egg and the eternal recurrence of life.
The piece takes its name of the landscape and inspiration from the Tuscarora people, whose ancestral history spans from Eastern North Carolina. Their journey marked by displacement, conflict, and resettlement forms a metaphorical backbone for the performance, representing both literal and symbolic reproduction and renewal.
In this work, I construct a circle through movement and geography: retracing the Tuscarora migration by traveling in a handmade skin-on-frame canoe, crafted from oak, ballistic nylon and deer hides, powered by an oak paddle symbolizing the sperm cell. The 28 day journey begins in the tributaries of the Tuscarora Creek, flows into the Chesapeake Bay, and ultimately reaches the Pamlico Sound, following the historic waterways of migration and transformation.
The Chesapeake Bay becomes a potent symbol of union the convergence of male and female, marked by the geological wound of the Chesapeake Bay Impact Crater. This site to be the result of a massive asteroid collision, metaphorically stands in for the female form Earth absorbing the male form the meteor, seeking to be absorbed
This act of collision, of impact, of climax mirrors the Moons creation in the Theia Impact and orgasmic moment of reproduction. The canoe's passage through this geography into the final stage of the performance, the canoe is submerged in the Pamlico Sound an act of entering the cytoplasm.
Nine months later, as in the gestational cycle, the canoe is intended to be retrieved and resurrected completing the circle of regeneration.












































































































































































































































































