sacred feminine service
Wave Farm Radio Residency, 2022.
Inspired by the overwhelming data that links radiation emissions of cell towers and 5G technology to the spectrum of biological and behavioral side effects experienced by honeybees, I set out to engage in processes of converting EMF radiation into sound waves with my colleague Grant Cutler. Using a number of electronic measurement devices, we captured radiation waves from local bee hives; transmuting these libraries of sound into broadcast material for collaborative sound installations. Our work sought to create opportunities for education on the impact of EMF radiation within our local Hudson landscape, while reflecting on the ways that the bodies and complex communication systems of honeybees mirror our own. Through a series of daily field recordings, we explored practices of deep listening, to both the activity of honeybees inside the hive, and the reverberation of sound transmissions within the ecology of their field of resonance. We were interested in listening to the fluctuations in vibroacoustics caused by EMF radiation, which offer insight into the damaging consequences of living in our increasingly 5G-centered world. With this archive of materials, we aimed to create psychic maps for interactive dialogue with honeybees and their transmissions on sovereignty, accountability, community, and sustainability.
about my CREATIVE PRACTICE
My service is a cross-pollination across disciplines, and I am very grateful to be in collaboration and conversation with bee guardians, bee enthusiasts, scientists, astronomers, community builders, culture makers, maverick thinkers, scholars, artists, musicians, dancers, healers, and wisdom keepers. I weave together an in-depth study of apicology and its connections to both my indigenous identity and the sacred feminine. I investigate the relationship between honeybees, pleasure, and the erotic through movement, written expositions, sound installation, and film collage. I am fascinated by the organic movements of bees, and how dance is uniquely used as a form of communication among bees in the hive. Through these vehicles, I serve the bees and our planet by connecting contemporary knowledge of bees and beekeeping to ancient lineages of spiritual practices and cultural belief systems that held the bee as sacred vessels for healing.
POLLINATED HAPPENINGS
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On June 1st, 2025, I was proud to support the opening of DISABILITY IN THE BLACK COMMUNITY, with a live reading of the PBS op-ed “Falling into FSHD and Disability in the Black Community", featuring an incredible accompaniment by cellist Sarah Overton. The event was curated by our beloved brother Brian Tate, co-hosted by Tate Strategy and Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church (LAPC), featuring a community conversation with musician Mikel Mwalimu-Banks and photographer Russell Frederick, moderated by multidisciplinary artist Niama Safia Sandy. This amazing offering is now available on video for folks who'd like to tune in.
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It was a joy to co-facilitate a Brooklyn-based water ceremony for Living Soils Rising in May of 2025. The Soils and Spirit Project is an urgently needed work conceived by interdisciplinary eco-puppetry artist Marina ‘Heron’ Tsaplina "to connect people from diverse lineages to the histories and spirits of place". Her work is powerfully seeded and growing! Photos and reflections coming soon!
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In April 2025, both my husband, Mikel Mwalimu-Banks and myself, were beyond thrilled to contribute to Planting Disabled Futures, a performance offering and virtual reality ritual by disability culture activist, writer, dance video maker and community performance artist, Petra Kupper. Mikel co-created a track both ancient and future, with artists Gregory Kage, EM Gong, and Richard Anderson, using Gregory Kage's original* musical instruments, and conceived entirely out of recycled materials. I joined several collaborators in offering additional portal material to this rich dialogue on the poetics of movement, space, place, sensuality, access, and community, with brilliant disabled comrade choreographers/film-makers/dancers. Photos on the way!
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Happy to share that a collaborative essay written by myself, and my dear friend and colleague Lucia Pavone (Sciarpa Paxton) has been published in the May 2025 issue of the Black Earth Institute's About Place Journal, celebrating careful collaboration. The article features a short video that I had the joy of weaving together in the editing process, as an original submission for our Women's Mysteries And Sacred Arts graduate course at the California Institute of Integral Study (CIIS). Tune into our video submission here!
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Updates on presentations including the Association for the Study of Women in Mythology's (ASWM) 2025 Conference, the If I Can't Dance's Tidal Wave Gatherings Offering in Amsterdam, Netherlands, curated by the extraordinary Chandra Frank, as well as Naropa University's 2024 Electric Black Earth Festival (lovingly held and co-woven by my dear sister Regina Smith and the amazing Ramon Gabrielloff-Parish), are in progress.
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I had the great pleasure of returning to Wave Farm Radio as a Fellow for the 2023-2024 cycle, along with the lovely musician and sound artist, Lia Kohl. Meditations on this wonderful opportunity are also in gestation.
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In 2022, I served on 'Team Bee', as a Rahibe Faculty Member at the College of the Melissae, where I taught Part 1 of my course: Re-membering Herstory: Unveiling the Bee in Sacred Feminine Wisdom, which explores connections between the Isian & Eleusinian Mysteries in venerating the ancient honeybee.
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Transmissions From The Sacred Feminine: A Labyrinth Journey Into The Center Of The Hive is a non-chronological experimental film which documents my study and performance creation over the course of the 2020-2022 graduate academic semesters at Goddard College, Vermont. My thesis stitches together global narratives of the sacred feminine to the story of my own becoming, through what I call, "the water mandala". The film is an articulation of its mark upon my body of work, as an artist, mother, writer, priestess, and global community citizen. I was thrilled and honored that the film debuted for a packed audience, at The Free Black Women's Library on October 19th, 2023.
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My 2021 graduate practicum work entitled, In The Center of The Hive: Honey Bees, Ritual Movement, and Sound Within The Ecology of the Sacred Feminine served as a sanctuary for my inquiries about bees, water, the sacred feminine and indigenous identity. For permissions to read or reference this work, please send me an email.
