RINSE

As the daughter of parents who are members of the Bundjalung and Ngāpuhi peoples—part of the indigenous populations of Australia's Aboriginal peoples and New Zealand's Māori—award-winning multidisciplinary artist Amrita Hepi is familiar with colonial violence.

Drawing on this experience, Hepi's Rinse challenges Western cultures' focus on linear storytelling and the myth of a “single origin.” Beyond the assertion that there must be a beginning, an intimate dance solo unfolds, moving through history, theory, pop culture, and colonial narratives. In doing so, she relates her own complex identity to a reality that is increasingly falling apart.

An interspace between beginning and end—a physical meditation on being alone in the world. In the tension between self-assertion and dissolution, the solo points to a different idea of identity and collectivity: not as a harmonious unity, but as a fragile relationship that must be constantly rethought—also, and especially, from the perspective of the individual.

Amrita Hepi currently works and lives in Naarm (Melbourne) and Bangkok. Her artistic interest focuses on archives—particularly in relation to the body and how it is shaped and organized by origin, events, relationships, and environment.

She has received numerous awards, including two Keir Choreographic Awards Audience Awards, and was featured in Forbes' “30 under 30” list for the arts. Rinse was invited to the renowned Avignon Festival this summer.

Co-Writer, Choreographer and Performer Amrita Hepi

Co-Writer & Director & Co-Writer Mish Grigor

Sound Design and Composer Daniel Jenatsch

Lighting Design Matt Adey

Produced by Performing Lines

Rinse is produced by Performing Lines, and supported by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its arts investment and advisory body, the NSW Government through Create NSW and APHIDS. It was commissioned by Performance Space and co-commissioned by the Keir Foundation, Carrigeworks and Dancehouse for the 2020 Keir Choreographic Award, and has been supported by Supercell: Festival of Contemporary Dance through the Makers Program.

Guest production with the kind support of the Kunststiftung NRW.