#4468. The application of a translational performance method using archival material, personal narrative, mythology and somatic practices: the making of Womb of Fire

August 2026publication date
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Visual Arts and Performing Arts;
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Abstract:
The article offers a pragmatic investigation that addresses translation both as an embodied activity of recalling erased memory and as a recuperation of the dis-membered post-slave/post-colonial female body. Through reflecting on an example of personal performance practice, the study employs the performer and playwrights own post-slave/post-colonial body as the locus of intersection between the private and the political, the biological and archival/historical. The article focuses on Womb of Fire, a production that weaves the stories of three women: Draupadi from the Indian Epic, The Mahabharata, Catrijn (1631–1682), the first recorded female convict slave banished to the Dutch-occupied Cape of Good Hope, and Zara (1648–1671), a Khoikhoi woman, born in the Cape and employed as a servant from a young age. The study draws from Abrahams and Matchetts respective areas of research. Her method of performance-making, in this context, addresses how the post-slave body practically translates the archival narratives, and in particular how these intersect with the biological/personal.
Keywords:
breath; Fitzmaurice Voicework®; performance-making; translation in performance; women & performance

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