Author Identifier (ORCID)
Abstract
In this paper we argue that performance and the arts invite a deliberate sensorial connection with the body and can support a bodily turn or return, in order to help artists, scholars and communities more broadly, better attune to increasing climate instability, through collaborative, supportive and reflexive storytelling. Drawing on the three “weather” symposia, the paper focusses on the second symposium which featured a keynote presentation by Rachael Swain, co-artistic director of Marrugeku, Australia’s leading Indigenous Intercultural Dance and Performance Company. Responses to Marrugeku’s work Cut the Sky are collectively presented to illuminate what Swain argues are, “Dramaturgies of consequence” (2020), that emerge from working and thinking with the choreopolitical platform of Marrugeku’s practice, and how this is felt in the bodies and the actions of audiences. Such a focus on thinking and feeling with and through our bodies, is crucial in preparing to respond and adapt to the myriad evolving political, environmental and social crises we are enmeshed in. By focusing on Cut The Sky we argue that contemporary performance, which foregrounds the body, is an exemplary practice which can ignite visceral and kinaesthetic responses in spectators for activating change through Marrugeku’s choreography of resistance.
Keywords
contested weather, Cut the Sky, Marrugeku, performance, relationality
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of Publication
1-1-2026
ISSN
08140626
Publication Title
Australian Journal of Environmental Education
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
School
Centre for People, Place and Planet / Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA)
RAS ID
95305
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
Recommended Citation
Grehan, H., Pollitt, J., Slater, O., & Fox, S. (2026). Relating to difficult weather through creative practice: Responses to Marrugeku’s Cut the Sky. Australian Journal of Environmental Education, 42(3), 908–919. https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2026.10185