Essay by Alicia Crowhurst for Contextualising Practice

Introduction

Transmutation is the action of changing or the state of being changed into another form. This essay argues that theatre grants you the faculties to forge transmutative capacity and, thus, engage in a practice of continual becoming. Framing my practice under Bracha Ettinger’s Matrixial theory^[1], I locate theatre as a transubjective, symbiotic dimension of consciousness, where collaborators renegotiate their understandings of time, space and trust. The essay also outlines my ethos for building theatre, elucidating the need for reconstituted understandings of temporal reconstructions and a recognition that Eros (as affectual resonance) is inherently aroused in collaborative process. I then explain my praxis: workshops that draw on writings on improvisation and performance studies and encourage embodiment. Such discussion contextualises my project Copoiesis as a non-linear, co-emerged project of testing and playing.

Matrixial Theory, conduit to the practice of Theatre ‘Building’

In her seminal text Fragilization and Resistance (2009), Bracha  Ettinger introduces her theory of ‘Matrixial’ space: a space of shared consciousness that permits ‘transsubjective’ symbiosis ( 2009). Contending with traditional and perceptually ‘phallocentric’ views of psyche in psychoanalysis, Ettinger postulates that human beings — having gestated, grown, and shared space with/in a m/other — are inherently trans-connected and ‘co-emerged’ beings (see also Romanskaite, 2012). Hence, Ettinger asserts that from our conception, entering with/in a shared, Matrixial space (womb), we are fundamentally relational, and equipped with a modality of apprehending an ‘other’: that fundamentally, ‘there is no I without a non-I’ (Ettinger, 2007: 2:37). Ettinger’s theory is expanded to artistic practice in The Matrixial Borderspace (2006). The text suggests that artistic production and participation —being processes which “transform” conceptions of the social, temporal, and cultural — facilitate immersion with/in the Matrixial space (Ettinger, 2006: 129). This theoretical consideration is fundamental to my practice of building and operating a theatre. I recognise theatre, primarily, as a site which transmutes the energy and conceptions pertaining to the arriving ‘I’/self. And, consequently, as a site of symbiotic relational union between ‘I’ and ‘non-I’, and a dimension of continual becoming. Having meditated on Ettinger’s (2006 & 2009) logic of Matrixial space —first manifesting with/in the shared consciousness of the ‘womb’ and being locatable in life through artistic pursuits — I find it helpful to apply metaphorical logics surrounding the womb, of gestation and birthing,to generate understanding around the ‘building’ process I undertake in my practice. Understanding theatre as a site of relational union, as a  metaphorical site of a ‘womb’, helps us perceive the  theatre an an incubatory, shared, energetic space, which permits bodies and selves to unite and change relationally under a common ethos. In this ‘womb’ space, ‘gestation’ is granted through praxis. The weekly workshops that I developed that encouraged meditations on the body, mind, spirit and gesture, facilitated a transmutation of ideas of temporality, and championed Eros as a fundamental consideration in the groups ethos. Core members of the theatre challenge the idea of ‘I’ as separate to ‘non-I’, and in doing so, acknowledge and forge a capacity for what Ettinger calls the transsubjective symbiosis (2005). As a core member articulated in an interview:

I start with myself. I move from my body, to a third body, one that does not belong to me, but to the whole cast. In mirroring [core member], I now see not just her, or myself, but energy. I am moved to an in-between space, which changes my conception of daily life when I leave.

Frequent engagement in praxis allows core members to transmute the conditions of ‘I’ and ‘birth’ into a third entity. This third entity —being Matrixial space —is a transubjective state of symbiosis and consciousness. This semester, core members have facilitated the birth of the production (Copoiesis). This aligns with Matrixial theory, which suggests that theatre permits a continual becoming; the practice of transmuting life.

Transmuting Temporalities as part of Ethos

Working into transubjective relational spaces requires a questioning of the temporal constructs (past, present and future), and how they may work to posit the ‘I’ as symbolically differentiated and dislocated from the ‘non-I’. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I do not subscribe to the logic that time functions in a linear, progressive manner (despite my position in a capitalistic, patriarchal, colonial temporal context). I conduct my personhood with the ethos that time does not simply pass, but that it accumulates. This extends to my workshop praxis and my production Copoiesis, where temporal constructs are constantly renegotiated: we think of time alternatively to it as a guiding construct, and entertain the notion of ‘time’ as instances of sentience perpetually collaging and manifesting themselves: “moments in time seem to exist as entities, which feed themselves so as to remain alive and autonomous” (Piertzniak, 2025). This notion is tended to by Kosmina (2020), a philosopher of feminist temporality, who, concerned with the re-materialisation of the ‘past’, postulates that time inhabits spectral presences which punctuate femme and queer narratives. She attributes this spectral entity to events and their emotional affect, which- not stationary to their denoted temporal construct- are disruptive, returning, persistent and prompting presences: “This feminist temporality… remembers the past, in the present, for the future” (Kosmina, 2020: 901). To visualise this process, Kosmina describes temporal events as ‘threads’, which, when warped and wefted, “mirror the collapse of past and future that the spectre brings about” (Kosmina, 2020: 901).

As such, it can be recognised that the aura and affect of an encounter-event do not pertain to a temporal category, but are actively imbricated, and are influencing our modality of being: spectral presences inhabit and conduct us long after or before temporal events have occurred. This temporal imbrication manifests in my workshop praxis (an ongoing ‘artwork’) and in production Copoiesis, where core members respond to prompts and embody spectral presences specific to their experience of sentience. Important to maintain awareness of is the fact that when spectral inhabitations are facilitated in the theatre, there is the possibility of co-experiencing traumatic encounters, as well as healing through encounter with others (Ettinger 2005). Thus, working with and performing in matrixial space leads to the dissolution of personal border-spaces and a meditation on temporal affect, which requires a substantiative emotional ethos to safeguard core-members.

Eros qua ethos

Eros is a fundamental component of my theatre ethos, ensuring the ‘building’ and maintenance of a relational, caring, and transmutative environment. As touched on earlier, working towards accessing Matrixial and non-linear space requires collaborators to test thresholds of their understandings of self, memory and identity. Bosacci (2018: 346), discusses Matrixial Theory in relation to the collaborative process, affirming that within these dynamics, wit(h)nesting occurs and a person is ‘unsettled’, ‘provoked’ and effectively ‘transformed’  when a person is subject to affect and ‘more than visual’ sensing. In attempting to locate, share and transmute Matrixial space, members of the theatre collaborate and are subjected to affectual resonance. The frequency of affect experienced by each participant is fundamentally different, but it always influences contemplation of personal histories, identity, temporality and understandings of compassion. This is since, during praxis, symbolic markers of identity precipitate, causing participants to recognise that the ‘I’, and the ‘non-I’ are in a constant metamorphosis: a metamorphosis that sometimes does not instantaneously permit symbiosis and creates a “gap like schism” in our feeling of relating to the ‘non-I’ (Topliss, 2022:8). This affecting sensation is identified as Eros. Carson (1986) outlines that Eros as the affectual resonance of lack in witnessing the ‘non-i’: “If we follow the trajectory of Eros we consistently find it tracing out this same route: it moves out from the lover toward the beloved, then ricochets back to the lover [her]self and the hole in [her], unnoticed before” (Carson, 1986: 30).

As such, in the process of building theatre, core members experience Eros when confronting the fragmented nature of the human identity. Embarking on Matrixial dimensions, we recognise the modalities we have constructed and operate within our personhood, which abstract us from total transsubjective semblance. We recognise our constructions of ‘otherness’, esteem and fear-facets of our arriving, individual temporal imbrication to the Matrixial space and we feel this ‘hole’, this ‘lack’ (Carson, 1986). Nonetheless, this lack is not to be read as mere ‘deficiency’ or ‘absence’, but reconstituted as a generative force, a kind of force that “moves” us (Haas, 2002: 2). The subsequent co-experiencing of the traumatic  healing through encounter that is engaged whilst operating in the Matrixial theatre space can be mediated effectively under an ethos of recognising and accommodating for Eros. We achieve this by locating each core member as being in a continual cycle of transmutation. So as to give agency to this process, and to reach transubjective symbiosis for performance, I invite core members to engage in a workshop praxis, to bring awareness to moments of encounter which elongate feelings of Eros: “the interval between reach and grasp, between glance and counter-glance, between ‘I love you’ and ‘I love you too’” (Carson, 1986: 30)

Workshops: praxis for theatre building

My conceptions of the theatre ethos, and the Copoiesis performance have been ‘built’ from the workshops. Run bi-weekly in changing locations, the workshops (what I consider to be an ongoing artwork) operate under the theoretical consideration of Maxtrixial space, and seek to foster core members transmutative capacities for the instance of performance. Within these sessions, to bring contemplation to understandings of temporality and to mediate inherent encounters with ‘lack’, there is a predominant focus on movement. I employ the term movement according to its German translation, inspired by Pina Bausch’s use of the term in her Tanztheater (Tanztheater Wuppertal 2025). ‘Bewegung’ postulates movement not just as the ‘loco’-motive gesture of stepping forward, but also considers the affectual qualities of a gesture: a transmuting from a motion to emotion, instigated from the ‘soul’ (Wenders, 2012). I began building theatre, not interested in ideas about how movements should relate, but instead, with an intrigue and attentive eye to the way things do happen to relate, when facilitated in often non-replicable energetic conditions. In the earliest stages of the workshops, core members and I recognised the distinct, burgeoning presences of social convention and temporal constraints. We found that the emergence of a ‘new idea’ or ‘thought’ often felt ‘interrupted’ before they were able to be ‘developed’ (Tufnell & Crickmay, 1990: 9). We recognised our routine habits and regard for the temporality of daily life. We found these contemplations were contributing to our preoccupations of the ‘I’ as distinct from ‘non-i’, and actively suppressing our capacity to access a transubjective state of consciousness. These super-structures were mediated by my following suggestions, which were committed to: core-members should meet consistently (weekly), there should be no temporal constraints on workshops and research (no definitive ending time or unexplored sensation), and we should develop prompts that primarily focus on our bodies: to see ourselves as Matrixial sites. The formulation of the prompts has been greatly influenced by Richard Schechener’s seminal text, Environmental Theatre (1973), which encourages performers to develop a symbiotic relationship between self and performance space in order to discover ‘true capacities of transformation’. I  merge Schechner’s teachings with my certified studies of Asana and Pranayama (Rishikesh YTTC, 2024).

Focusing on Bewegung for the first six weeks, core members of the theatre grew a profound sense of embodiment, connection to inner sensation and ways of communicating non-verbally. This eventually built the possibility for Eros to affect, for co-emergence to begin, and for Copoiesis to start being written in week seven. See below a quote of mine from my Workshop journal archive, regarding week seven’s session (refer also to Figure 5).

“ Today we finally saw one another. Painfully, beautifully. We talked of the landscapes of our hearts. I then watched myself move. I say I watched, because I was truly behind myself. I watched us all move. I say all of us because I contained everyone’s energy. I watched her breathe in the dust from the floors. I watched her trace her tongue along the walls. I watched her spinning until retching. Again. And again. I watched her, in a dance of departure.”

Thus, the workshops as praxis —permitting collective conversations, observations, images, and meditations — have fostered an active, practice-led research methodology and archive, which I have drawn upon to direct Copoiesis.

Copoiesis a Test Play

Copoiesis is the co-emerged, birthed entity of the discussed theatre building ethos and praxis. Referential to a term coined by Ettinger (2005), Copoiesis means ‘collaborative process of creation’, and the play itself is a meditation on Matrixial theory. I wrote Copoiesis to reflect my experience operating within the affective qualities of Matrixial space. The reality postulated in Copoiesis is a meditation on my last visit to my hometown in rural South Australia, which is saturated with what Mulvey-Roberts has articulated as  “symbolic connotations, mnemonic vestiges and oneiric residues” (2019: 43)

Meditating on Ettinger’s postulation, there is no ‘I’ without the ‘non-I’, the main character of Copoiesis is in constant metamorphosis between characters, performers and emotions; from passenger, to another core member, to dog, to architecture, to another core member, into dirt, to river reeds, to a lighthouse (refer to Monologue, Scene 3). This is also reflected in the scenography, made active by the core members, who act as symbolic vessels to the Matrixial reality. They are instrumental depending on the ever-changing context of the production (see figure 3); a chair becomes an instrument, then a wall, then a pier.

Monologue, Scene 3

Performer 3 starts digging up 5 potatoes.

I have collected 5 songs for you. I have them in a way so special. 5 lights, 5 dreams that create a very

distinct outline of you

pause

And burn the sites of your last touches

Temporal transmutation manifests in the performance structure and script of Copoiesis. Repetitions, loops, and digressions are preferred over a linear narrative structure, embracing fluidity (movement, or Eros) as truth and allowing core members the opportunity to access Matrixial space, as the subconscious becomes more receptive through roles that permit associative interpretation and inhabitation (Figure 4: Monologue, Scene 1).

Figure 4: Monologue, Scene 1

I am seeing stars on the floor today. I am hearing mens voices

Pause. Performer 1 returns to the top of the performance circle

I see stars on the floor. One mans glance becomes thousands of voices.

To present the journey of Eros (Carson, 1986) and make tangible the affect of ‘lack’, the performance is primarily movement-based. To permit transubjective symbiosis to occur in the live performance context, I have choreographed the performance according to the revelations of core members in the workshop praxis (kept alive through conversation and documentation as part of the practice-led research methodology and Theatre archive). See figure 5 for reference.

Conclusion

In building theatre , there is a co-emergent learning process taking place. The ethos and praxis established permit core members to be inextricably moved by the most common of moments, and permit opportunities for Eros in everyday encounters. As such, working with core members,‘building’ this theatre actively forges landscape ideas, and deep emotional repositories, which are reaccessed and alchemised into movement, self-reflection, production (Copoiesis) and fundamentally, friendship that extends outside of the workshop architectural space. As such, the theatre pertains to the ordinary instances of life, affirming experiences of relationality, intuition, and out of body sensing. The theatre is a site of continual becoming.

 

Notes

^[1]  Ettingers Matrixial theory postulates a transubjectivity in the subject, and in human relationships

References

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