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Death is being human
first, like we all die.

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That's one of the truths.

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You know, that doesn't change.

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And so I not know what value is.

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Maybe people think that you can
make value of something, but I

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think value is already there.

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The moment you're born.

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It is just looking at ways of
being that just show you the value.

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No matter if you are lame or you
are sick or you are deceased.

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Welcome to Don't Be Caught Dead.

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A podcast encouraging open conversations
about dying and the death of a loved one.

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I'm your host, Catherine Ashton, founder
of Critical Info, and I'm helping to

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bring your stories of death back to
life because while you may not be ready

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to die, at least you can be prepared.

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Don't be caught dead, acknowledges
the lands of the cool and nations.

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And recognizes their connection
to land, sea, and community.

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We pay our respects to their elders
past, present, and emerging, and

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extend that respect to all Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander and First

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Nation peoples around the globe.

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Today I am speaking with Tony Yap, an
accomplished dancer and multidisciplinary

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artist who explores and creates an
individual dance theater language

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informed by psychophysical research,
Asian shamanistic trance dance.

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Boto and psycho vocal experimentations.

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Thank you for being with us, Tony.

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Thank you for having me.

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Now, Tony, did I get that word

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correct?

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Butoh?

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Butoh?

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Yes.

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Butoh is correct.

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Yeah.

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What is Butoh?

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Well,

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Butoh started in

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the late fifties early.

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Sixties in Japan is a dance form, like a
lot of avantgarde dance forms around the

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world that has a kind of a new movements
against the traditional, you know, like

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Mother Graham in the US in Japan was
a postwar response, you know, of a new

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kind of aesthetics against kabuki No.

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And all the kind of traditional forms.

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So it has a kind of darker, freer element
to the aesthetics, to the movement.

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And in Japan it was influenced by
German expressionist and thinkers

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of the theater like Anton Naau.

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So he's breaking out from.

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A very ordered area into a kind
of more darker psyche order thing.

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And so a lot of that was started at that
time and it went raw in the beginning and

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then now you refine the new phases of it.

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But that

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was Bud.

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ButohH started

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in Japan.

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But it does have a lot of similarities.

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Also work like, like
tarella ion or hysteria.

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So these are all the kind of
aesthetics around the world that's

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similar to, uh, but it's dense
and it is something that is.

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They call it dance or the dark side.

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Oh really?

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Yeah.

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And how did you get
started in dance, Tony?

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I think dance is a very interesting thing
to talk about because when you think

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about dance, you know, you think about
social dances, fun, you know you're going

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out there and lose yourself in some kind
of a disco or the ears, rock and roll.

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So there are certain dance forms
that I always like dancing, but

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I've never thought myself as a
dancer because I wasn't trained.

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So I did find arts.

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And then when this aesthetics, I was
telling you late fifties started even

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in the West talking about dance for
non dancers, gestures and all the kind

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of aesthetics, why does the body move?

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And then, and of course later to
my studies now in reference to my

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background of trans and possession.

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And so in some way dance.

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It's what the body does in movement,
in relationship to why it needs

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to dance in a kind of art form.

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So now dance is, in my sense, it could
be dance theater, it could be a, you

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know, movement, physical theater.

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It could be a whole lot of situation.

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And you've seen my work.

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So in some way, yeah, it is specifically
between theater and nuns, I suppose.

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If you have to put in the category and
it's all in the body, so it's minimal

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in the sense of, you know, any kind
of need for decorations or effects.

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On the external, it is a cycle
physicality, so you tend to.

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Feel or see the interior rather than
the kind of ideas kind of visual base.

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So the choreographic things could
be more intense in that sense.

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Yeah.

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And to perhaps contextualize it
for the people who are listening.

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I saw you perform as part of the
Sydney Death and Dying Festival

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last year, and I was absolutely
captivated by your performance.

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I found it so beautifully
emotional and it was very simple.

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How it was just a spotlight
on a stage on you.

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You, you danced within a rope that
I believe from memory it was on the

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ground and it was just a very simple
stage for you to perform on, but I

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just could not take my eyes off you.

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And it was such an
emotional and it really was.

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I can see why it's that psychophysical
aspect of embodying the emotion.

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Yeah.

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And so tell me, you started off
in doing a fine arts degree.

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Yes.

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What was that in?

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Was that in theater or performance or?

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The first one is fine
arts, which is visual arts.

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So, you know, I majored in
printmaking, I did sculpture.

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I did the whole lot of, of
what necessary intelligence.

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But then later I became a
graphic designer, just as

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a way of making a living.

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And this is in the seventies.

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Yeah.

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You know, it is very, you very draw.

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No AI already.

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But the shift to theater began
when I started in ham with

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a contemporary art group and
performance art became quite known.

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So I shifted.

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My first performance was
in 1982 or something.

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It was a big shift for me to suddenly
realize my body had something.

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Very natural for me to express this deep
sense of myself, and I'm still a visual

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artist, and so I did after that because
of graphic design, I did honors, and then

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later I also finished a PhD focusing on
this trance and physicality, this area of

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how it affects contemporary dancers and
how it can help some kind of link between

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eastern and western dance aesthetics now.

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But nowadays, it hasn't been happening.

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It has always been happening,
but I think it's not often that

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you see a Eastern practitioner.

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Articulating it from the practice from
where they were born and practice.

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Usually it's a western going to
the east to study these methods.

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And then you read everything
about the eastern.

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And so I learned from the west,
we learn from the eastern.

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So I said, but this is a time I
articulate it from the inside perspective.

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I think they call it IC and ethics.

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So IC is, yeah, from the inside side.

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So that is my contribution.

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And I feel it is an important one because
there's a lot of things written and as

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a practitioner, 'cause I was brought
up in a temple in a, in the background

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of where I was born, my house was a
temple and then people going to France

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in this DAO is kind of setting temple.

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So it is quite exotic and different
from the western perspective

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in the general middle sense.

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But to me it was just an
everyday thing, you know?

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And for a lot of people in this, so how.

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Does this intensity relate
to contemporary practice now?

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Like such, a lot of people love
it and they may be long for it.

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After a whole lot of over rationalize,
over recent forms of art, there

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is an area where it is intensity.

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It's actually cathartic and
it is visceral in the meaning.

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And that I think there
is a big hunger for that.

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So that's my visual
background to to performance.

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And can you tell me a little
bit about your heritage?

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You say that you grew up with, you
know, a temple in your backyard.

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Tell us a little bit about where you
grew up and what your heritage is, Tony.

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Well, you know, my, my mother was
adopted, you know, as I found out in

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my DN age, she had actually got the,
like Indonesia right to Louisiana or

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so maybe about 15% of that is from her.

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She was adopted and her father, my.

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Grandfather was half Irish and half
Sri Lankan, and my father's side

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was a Southern China in Hainan, so
near Vietnam and intermarried with

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the indigenous mountain people.

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So being all that, I'm basically
more Chinese than anything in the

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China South Chinese in the Chinese
heritage, but culturally, my mother's.

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Adopted, you know,
parents were Christians.

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My father's side were Dao is Buddhist.

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And so when my mother married
my father, it naturally became

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the practice of our family.

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But I wanted a Christian school, you know,
a kind of a mission Christian school.

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And so I was converted to Christianity
and thus I adopted the name Anthony.

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Tony is Christian.

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Yep.

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And so these are the kind of
change, but this is from the

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fifties to the sixties, so it's a
different era as you're talking now.

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So the international sense
of multiculturalism is quite

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different from those days.

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Those days my mother didn't even
have a birth certificate, you

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know, so it is kind of a shift.

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So I have that cultural background,
but religiously and even spiritually,

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it's animistic society, people believe.

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In a lot of, uh, energy and spirit
of place, what I call kind of psycho

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geography or genius, Loki or spirit
of, yeah, sacred space or sacred land.

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So all this kind of area in my
practice come from that background.

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And even though I was a Buddhist,
brought up Buddhist and DAUs, which says.

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The temple sin in my house, which
is da, and it has a lot of gods.

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So they're like archetypes of, I
suppose, and the archetypes of multiple

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gods, like the Greeks or the Hindus?

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Yeah, like our psyche, you
know, the God is of mercy.

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And then the child, the innocent, and
then the monkey, the animal, and then

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the effeminate, you know, bagger.

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So these are all the gods in some way.

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And then they are the classic gods
or the warriors and the, you know,

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gods of war and gods of hell.

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And so there's many, I dunno
how I would say hundreds, but

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there are many archetypes.

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So these gods say once or twice a week,
normal people in the villages will come,

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mostly Chinese in the area and in their
face will come and there will be a medium.

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Being possessed by one of his
gods and then they will consult.

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So it's this link between these two
worlds of the living and a whole.

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I don't know, but you call it, it is
not, I mean, when I hear about the

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remedies, they're very sound advisors.

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Sometimes, you know something
like, eat well, you know, and

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don't fight your neighbors.

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You know, something all
being on good terms.

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And of course you know that there actually
is wellbeing, you know, like yeah.

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In good terms, so, so it gives them a kind
of authority for a God or goddess or daily

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to tell them something they already know.

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That is my interpretation of it.

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And then sometimes people go
with very clear, simple needs

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like money, you know, like.

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How am I gonna survive?

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You know?

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And then I suppose that
itself is say interesting.

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I mean, if I go further, I could
see how when one fears less, there

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is more creativity, usually fear
itself, you know, hinders the kind of

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possible anything that might happen.

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Right.

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So this was a regular occurrence?

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Yes.

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In your community?

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Yeah, that it would happen once a week,

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once or twice a week.

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But it varies sometimes, you know,
once a month and then a special

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occasion of a birthday of a God.

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And then they also have this kind
of physical fees like walking

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on fire and cutting your back
with an X and things like that.

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Or a ball of spikes, always to remind you
that these gods are kind of supernatural.

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Which in a psychic sense we do anyway.

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You know, like, you know, we do super
things when the necessity comes.

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And so this was the environment
that you grew up in, Tony?

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Yeah.

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And not to mention that, you know,
like the school was a very rational

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place and we tried to excel.

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You know, and thus it was a very important
time after the independence of Malaysia

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where they push a whole generation to
study hard and to achieve, you know,

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academic levels that they couldn't
about our parents and our generation.

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So they were more practical mostly.

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But my father was learned.

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He was actually a detective,
so he actually had a, a pot.

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Oh, really?

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00:13:54,185 --> 00:13:54,545
Yeah.

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00:13:54,545 --> 00:13:54,785
So.

236
00:13:54,995 --> 00:13:58,445
He had opportunity to learn and
to study and work for the five

237
00:13:58,445 --> 00:14:01,835
governments, including the British,
you know, stress settlements.

238
00:14:01,835 --> 00:14:06,425
And then he goes on to Japanese occupation
and the new government, the independence.

239
00:14:06,425 --> 00:14:10,145
So he worked under five different
governments and so it's interesting.

240
00:14:10,235 --> 00:14:11,765
All very interesting.

241
00:14:11,915 --> 00:14:14,705
It's so interesting that what you're
actually talking about, because there's

242
00:14:14,705 --> 00:14:19,985
obviously such a contrast between
the community aspect and having these

243
00:14:19,985 --> 00:14:24,395
regular, you know, community group
experiences where you're talking about

244
00:14:24,395 --> 00:14:29,795
deities, spirituality and then you
are yet at the same time attending a

245
00:14:29,795 --> 00:14:33,485
Christian school, which has obviously
got probably very different views

246
00:14:33,485 --> 00:14:34,865
at that particular point in time.

247
00:14:35,075 --> 00:14:40,955
But also from what you're saying, just
the amount of change in structure and

248
00:14:41,075 --> 00:14:45,065
of just a country such as Malaysia
in such a short period of time.

249
00:14:45,395 --> 00:14:45,485
Mm-hmm.

250
00:14:45,485 --> 00:14:48,875
What you were saying, just what your
father went through with just different.

251
00:14:49,235 --> 00:14:52,295
Regulations and governments
and such turmoil.

252
00:14:52,295 --> 00:14:56,285
Do you think that has provided a
really good platform for you to move

253
00:14:56,285 --> 00:15:00,725
into the work that you've moved into
with your psychophysical research?

254
00:15:00,905 --> 00:15:06,275
I think that multiplicity of things
is rich and it only should be.

255
00:15:06,335 --> 00:15:09,935
And every time when something
simple, I find it more difficult.

256
00:15:10,055 --> 00:15:14,165
You know, like singular, like saying
that this is the right culture

257
00:15:14,495 --> 00:15:15,905
and you can't understand that.

258
00:15:16,440 --> 00:15:19,685
You can't understand how
one person can be right.

259
00:15:19,865 --> 00:15:23,735
You know, when you have all this
exposed to multiple views, you know,

260
00:15:23,735 --> 00:15:28,505
like multiplicity and it's always
a kind of cynicism I will have when

261
00:15:28,505 --> 00:15:32,705
somebody so certain of something
is it, how can you be so certain?

262
00:15:32,855 --> 00:15:34,660
Like so, so that is.

263
00:15:35,265 --> 00:15:37,905
That kind of base there,
you know, every time.

264
00:15:38,385 --> 00:15:43,275
And yeah, so it didn't make me think
that life itself is so complicated

265
00:15:43,905 --> 00:15:45,555
and so varied all the time.

266
00:15:46,035 --> 00:15:50,415
I always link like everybody else in
a very simple ways of being human.

267
00:15:50,505 --> 00:15:56,685
You know, like how you are sudden or
you're angry or you have strife for

268
00:15:56,685 --> 00:16:01,965
something more, or desires and or
you know, the ego or the super ego

269
00:16:02,295 --> 00:16:03,855
wanting to have something better.

270
00:16:04,095 --> 00:16:05,565
It's just being human like that.

271
00:16:05,625 --> 00:16:13,365
But I travel easier if I have a wider
sense of language and vocabulary.

272
00:16:13,995 --> 00:16:18,195
I think when I go back traveling
around Southeast Asia, I feel

273
00:16:18,195 --> 00:16:19,665
very much at home everywhere.

274
00:16:19,665 --> 00:16:24,255
But I can say to some extent I
can communicate in the west, but

275
00:16:24,375 --> 00:16:28,365
I see a difference like in Europe.

276
00:16:28,725 --> 00:16:30,675
You know, but I still
feel very comfortable.

277
00:16:30,675 --> 00:16:32,385
I mean, but you know, when
you're traveling, you are,

278
00:16:32,444 --> 00:16:33,525
you're comfortable anywhere.

279
00:16:34,005 --> 00:16:36,525
But when you have to live
there, it might be different.

280
00:16:37,365 --> 00:16:39,765
So the sense of like, even
in the countryside, right?

281
00:16:39,765 --> 00:16:42,199
People say, I can live
there, but you can't.

282
00:16:42,585 --> 00:16:44,835
You can visit there, you know?

283
00:16:44,835 --> 00:16:45,045
Yeah.

284
00:16:45,225 --> 00:16:50,865
So the sense is knowing oneself,
I think it's more on the process

285
00:16:50,865 --> 00:16:55,665
of knowing this home body rather
than this variations of things.

286
00:16:56,025 --> 00:17:00,645
So many things could happen in
lifetime for sure, but we are going

287
00:17:00,944 --> 00:17:02,685
through tremendous thing right now.

288
00:17:02,685 --> 00:17:03,074
Right?

289
00:17:03,645 --> 00:17:05,775
In a global sense all the time.

290
00:17:06,224 --> 00:17:10,035
Even when the wall came down, every
time something happens, you know,

291
00:17:10,035 --> 00:17:15,494
when the Gaza start bombing, it's
also unfathomable when it happened.

292
00:17:15,899 --> 00:17:21,210
Until you see in retrospect, and I think
historically it has never quite changed.

293
00:17:21,569 --> 00:17:23,460
It always had that intensity.

294
00:17:24,060 --> 00:17:31,590
So maybe bringing our theme of death, it
actually is a revelation to understand

295
00:17:31,595 --> 00:17:36,720
this kind of a transness of things,
you know, like and to a certain idea

296
00:17:36,720 --> 00:17:43,710
that death itself is just a kind of
equal moment where you don't have

297
00:17:44,010 --> 00:17:47,220
memories, you don't think, and you just.

298
00:17:47,265 --> 00:17:47,325
Yeah.

299
00:17:48,555 --> 00:17:53,295
And often I don't think about all these
things that people ask me, like, how

300
00:17:53,295 --> 00:17:55,395
do you explain what you went through?

301
00:17:55,395 --> 00:17:55,695
Right.

302
00:17:55,905 --> 00:17:57,225
And vice versa.

303
00:17:57,375 --> 00:18:03,135
I'm sure everybody has a man's story of
how they just be human just to be born.

304
00:18:03,705 --> 00:18:03,975
Right.

305
00:18:04,155 --> 00:18:05,025
So different.

306
00:18:05,030 --> 00:18:05,230
Yeah.

307
00:18:05,535 --> 00:18:06,015
I am.

308
00:18:06,015 --> 00:18:09,315
And now also going to ask you that
question, was there one particular

309
00:18:09,915 --> 00:18:13,395
incident that that happened in your
life that made you go, look, I'm

310
00:18:13,395 --> 00:18:19,935
really going to focus on how my body
carries my emotions, and then make

311
00:18:19,935 --> 00:18:21,795
that the focus of your practice?

312
00:18:21,795 --> 00:18:22,305
Yeah.

313
00:18:22,725 --> 00:18:23,085
Well.

314
00:18:23,675 --> 00:18:29,675
I've been making my living in visual arts
mostly as a graphic designer, so like

315
00:18:29,675 --> 00:18:34,804
Chief Designer Melbourne University, LA
Trope, C-S-I-R-O, and then also working

316
00:18:34,804 --> 00:18:37,235
with the film festival for seven years.

317
00:18:37,415 --> 00:18:42,425
But during all that time, something else
was happening, so now it takes over.

318
00:18:42,425 --> 00:18:48,155
Now, you know, my whole practice,
my whole life is performance in that

319
00:18:48,155 --> 00:18:54,875
sense of multidisciplinary, multi
collaborative levels, but different

320
00:18:54,875 --> 00:18:59,855
time you need to identify, you know,
I'm a graphic designer, I'm a dancer.

321
00:19:00,365 --> 00:19:04,294
Well, in the eighties I did a lot of
workshops and a lot of things happened

322
00:19:04,294 --> 00:19:07,264
in Melbourne, from New York, from Japan.

323
00:19:07,264 --> 00:19:08,885
So there's a lot of influences.

324
00:19:09,705 --> 00:19:15,735
One of the companies from Italy asked me
to join them, and for five years I became

325
00:19:15,735 --> 00:19:18,314
one of their theater principal actor.

326
00:19:19,064 --> 00:19:20,415
And we travel a lot.

327
00:19:20,415 --> 00:19:25,185
And this introduced me to psycho
physicality and the kind of

328
00:19:25,185 --> 00:19:28,875
ideas from Atau to Grotowski,
which is, you know, they're all

329
00:19:28,875 --> 00:19:30,345
in the area of physical theater.

330
00:19:30,975 --> 00:19:36,495
And how later when I'm separated
from this Italian company, I

331
00:19:36,495 --> 00:19:39,405
started to think, then where am I?

332
00:19:39,435 --> 00:19:43,395
You know, then I begin to study
my own research and then my own

333
00:19:43,395 --> 00:19:51,165
company and my own methods of dance
workshops to understand the body.

334
00:19:51,675 --> 00:19:53,985
And it changes all the
time as I get older.

335
00:19:53,985 --> 00:19:57,495
You know, when I'm young, I could do
incredible things like summer assaults

336
00:19:57,495 --> 00:20:02,355
and stuff, but as you go older, you know
that there's a kind of interior intensity.

337
00:20:02,774 --> 00:20:03,705
That's important.

338
00:20:03,824 --> 00:20:05,955
The physicality has limits.

339
00:20:06,645 --> 00:20:10,485
And tell me about the company
and how that got started and what

340
00:20:10,485 --> 00:20:14,925
makes it unique to your particular
style that you've developed.

341
00:20:15,195 --> 00:20:15,435
Yes.

342
00:20:15,435 --> 00:20:17,925
So when I joined this account
company, it was mostly a lot of

343
00:20:17,925 --> 00:20:19,695
Greek tragedies they were putting on.

344
00:20:19,695 --> 00:20:22,635
And I was mainly, mostly the protagonist.

345
00:20:23,175 --> 00:20:26,955
And one of them was made, you know,
and suddenly I understood different

346
00:20:26,955 --> 00:20:31,004
ways of understanding how a man
can play a woman's part, or how it

347
00:20:31,004 --> 00:20:33,074
can be a sense of being displaced.

348
00:20:33,074 --> 00:20:37,425
Like Madea was from one land,
like she's a priestess to

349
00:20:37,725 --> 00:20:39,945
Athens to a very rational place.

350
00:20:40,245 --> 00:20:42,195
So these are all cross over.

351
00:20:42,195 --> 00:20:44,774
I felt like I learned a
lot from that company.

352
00:20:44,955 --> 00:20:48,074
And Rena was a director and.

353
00:20:48,350 --> 00:20:52,340
When they left in a natural
sense, quite complicated.

354
00:20:52,790 --> 00:20:54,890
Then I was left with,
what am I going to do?

355
00:20:55,070 --> 00:20:59,660
You know, so I've been recognized as
a teacher practitioner everywhere,

356
00:20:59,660 --> 00:21:04,940
but I don't really get the kind of
parts I get in this work in Australia.

357
00:21:05,060 --> 00:21:09,410
I started to get parts, but
I play very stereotype parts

358
00:21:09,410 --> 00:21:12,020
like, uh, Malaysian Pill Diver.

359
00:21:12,080 --> 00:21:16,760
So you won't find me playing, you know,
Hamlet in Shakespeare or something.

360
00:21:17,300 --> 00:21:22,040
But in the other kind of theater I
could like, you know, Peter Brook,

361
00:21:22,130 --> 00:21:27,410
they had a multi, so Europe is more
advanced in that kind of research

362
00:21:27,860 --> 00:21:32,750
or even though we are very close to
Asia in Australia, but in many other

363
00:21:32,750 --> 00:21:38,720
ways, we are very English and also we
do have very close Asian neighbors,

364
00:21:38,870 --> 00:21:40,550
and so it influence is different.

365
00:21:41,120 --> 00:21:42,500
So I play.

366
00:21:43,665 --> 00:21:47,325
Think that I said I'm gonna
give up performance and dance.

367
00:21:47,535 --> 00:21:51,285
But then my father died, so I did
a last performance and I wasn't

368
00:21:51,285 --> 00:21:53,265
recognized for my work much.

369
00:21:53,595 --> 00:21:56,625
And I said, this would be my last
performance called, call it Decay

370
00:21:56,625 --> 00:22:01,005
of the Angel and then I will just
immerse myself in graphic design

371
00:22:01,005 --> 00:22:02,780
and do well in the area, you know?

372
00:22:03,440 --> 00:22:09,465
But that was nominated for Male Dance
award in the Green Room Award and I won.

373
00:22:09,465 --> 00:22:13,485
So that kind of stopped me
from saying not dancing.

374
00:22:13,485 --> 00:22:18,405
So I continued and also it exposed
me to, a lot of people wanted to

375
00:22:18,405 --> 00:22:20,235
work with me in different ways.

376
00:22:20,235 --> 00:22:20,985
And so,

377
00:22:21,315 --> 00:22:24,825
because the Green Room Awards are the
most prestigious award you can get in

378
00:22:24,825 --> 00:22:26,625
Australia for dance, is that right?

379
00:22:27,195 --> 00:22:30,435
I'm not sure sure about Australia,
but definitely from Victoria.

380
00:22:30,945 --> 00:22:34,305
Yeah, it's a Victorian thing,
but then know Melbourne is.

381
00:22:35,175 --> 00:22:36,585
Uh, capital so we can see

382
00:22:39,555 --> 00:22:40,425
That's right, Tony.

383
00:22:40,425 --> 00:22:40,485
Yeah.

384
00:22:41,470 --> 00:22:41,760
Yeah.

385
00:22:42,375 --> 00:22:44,205
Well we can do anything here really.

386
00:22:44,205 --> 00:22:47,685
And that's the one thing beautiful
about Melbourne is that openness.

387
00:22:48,435 --> 00:22:53,895
You know, then I say I should start
my own method of work and continue.

388
00:22:53,895 --> 00:22:56,865
And then with that, the obvious
thing is to go back to where I come

389
00:22:56,865 --> 00:23:00,645
from because people have been saying
your performance is like ghostly

390
00:23:00,645 --> 00:23:02,955
and intensity is so different with.

391
00:23:04,125 --> 00:23:07,095
Like what you say, you know,
like when you see my performance.

392
00:23:07,335 --> 00:23:08,475
So where did that come from?

393
00:23:08,475 --> 00:23:11,625
It must come from where the
temple see and the intensity

394
00:23:11,625 --> 00:23:14,025
of the mediums and trans work.

395
00:23:14,355 --> 00:23:18,405
So I del into the research of
trans work and then I got little

396
00:23:18,405 --> 00:23:20,325
funding from Creative Victoria.

397
00:23:20,385 --> 00:23:25,185
Then Asia Link helped launch me into
another stage and then Australia

398
00:23:25,185 --> 00:23:30,045
Council gave me a dance fellowship so
it all accumulated and then I decided

399
00:23:30,045 --> 00:23:35,385
to do my PhD in a very late stage of
my life so that I can, you know, just

400
00:23:35,715 --> 00:23:39,315
harness and articulate all my life work.

401
00:23:39,795 --> 00:23:44,835
And so it that came animal, God, that's
actually the latest of my work, which

402
00:23:44,835 --> 00:23:50,625
I think represents in terms of minimal,
where the body does everything and

403
00:23:50,625 --> 00:23:57,075
it has all that language, enough for
critical experience for the audience

404
00:23:57,195 --> 00:23:59,085
and open up into kind of psycho sic.

405
00:24:00,149 --> 00:24:05,520
Emotional area for the audience
and perhaps cathartic in a sense.

406
00:24:05,520 --> 00:24:09,180
So it has a sense of unblocking
something for the audience.

407
00:24:09,480 --> 00:24:13,379
And likewise, you know, every time
I perform that, it's like a loop.

408
00:24:13,379 --> 00:24:17,655
You know, I get when the audience is
so focused, I. It's a look, you know,

409
00:24:17,655 --> 00:24:21,315
I become more focused and it just
so you know, it's quite interesting

410
00:24:21,315 --> 00:24:23,715
when I perform for the camera.

411
00:24:23,805 --> 00:24:27,615
Could you tell us a little bit
about how animal God came about?

412
00:24:28,125 --> 00:24:28,755
Yes.

413
00:24:28,875 --> 00:24:34,185
Well, animal God, when I did the research
on trans, I picked two area because

414
00:24:34,185 --> 00:24:38,175
people have a certain idea of what
trans is, but they don't understand.

415
00:24:38,205 --> 00:24:42,075
So, you know, I gave them two
perspective or practice one.

416
00:24:42,455 --> 00:24:47,915
It's a very high level culture,
like the royalties from, so they are

417
00:24:47,915 --> 00:24:51,065
rare royals and it's a court dance.

418
00:24:51,305 --> 00:24:55,445
It's very refined and they're always
reflecting deities and gauze and

419
00:24:55,445 --> 00:25:00,245
goddesses, you know, and on the other
end it's very raw animal kind of work

420
00:25:00,245 --> 00:25:06,785
where the tra is very di and scary and
you know, and very physical intense.

421
00:25:06,905 --> 00:25:08,225
And that is the animal.

422
00:25:08,225 --> 00:25:15,785
Usually it's like an in other kind
of, which I like the, and Duluth in a

423
00:25:15,785 --> 00:25:20,615
thousand plate two, toxic God becoming
intense, becoming animals, becoming God.

424
00:25:20,915 --> 00:25:25,895
So I use that in a reference also
to these two trans practices.

425
00:25:26,465 --> 00:25:30,335
So it gives you immediately an idea
that trans is not just one thing.

426
00:25:30,975 --> 00:25:32,955
You know, you can daydream.

427
00:25:33,014 --> 00:25:37,125
Even children naturally go to trans
and they all have different function,

428
00:25:37,215 --> 00:25:41,895
you know, and so I'm looking at a
deep trans area animal and then a

429
00:25:41,895 --> 00:25:46,995
very refined focus area, mesmerizing.

430
00:25:47,475 --> 00:25:49,575
And that part is what I mix.

431
00:25:49,575 --> 00:25:53,745
And you see these two elements in
my performance, you know, intense.

432
00:25:53,985 --> 00:25:59,085
And then you go into a very
suspended space of mesmerizing thing.

433
00:25:59,115 --> 00:26:02,115
And then you, maybe that's time
where people open themselves

434
00:26:02,475 --> 00:26:04,004
and sometimes people do cry.

435
00:26:04,514 --> 00:26:08,805
And so I work with this as my
choreographic, kind of notations.

436
00:26:09,135 --> 00:26:13,995
How do one does if it's not just
a physical kind of choreography.

437
00:26:14,264 --> 00:26:18,345
So it's an interior
choreography is more complex.

438
00:26:18,435 --> 00:26:22,095
So the structuring of
it make me think about.

439
00:26:22,425 --> 00:26:27,045
These two elements, and I call it
animal guard because you have this

440
00:26:27,045 --> 00:26:32,770
internal net external, you have
this focus and control area, and you

441
00:26:32,770 --> 00:26:37,905
have this, you know, this kind of no
control or you know, losing control.

442
00:26:37,965 --> 00:26:41,535
You want to, so you have a safe
space and how you create a safe

443
00:26:41,535 --> 00:26:45,825
space and how traditionally
people do that and how this can be

444
00:26:45,825 --> 00:26:49,065
interpreted into a contemporary arena.

445
00:26:49,065 --> 00:26:54,465
So, so you don't have to actually be
like, what this cultural practice is

446
00:26:54,525 --> 00:26:59,385
in Indonesia, in Java or there, 'cause
we are not them, we are ourselves.

447
00:26:59,385 --> 00:27:02,805
But to understand where it
come from, it's the same.

448
00:27:03,105 --> 00:27:06,975
And we might have had that for a
long time and lost it because we

449
00:27:06,975 --> 00:27:12,195
have become urbanized or whatever
in, in different ways of focus.

450
00:27:12,915 --> 00:27:18,225
But definitely it opens us back
into what really available one.

451
00:27:19,215 --> 00:27:21,945
Lacking maybe in one culture to the other.

452
00:27:22,215 --> 00:27:23,564
And this is a beautiful side.

453
00:27:23,655 --> 00:27:23,834
Yeah.

454
00:27:24,254 --> 00:27:28,395
And Tony, when you are referring
to the traditional roots of

455
00:27:28,395 --> 00:27:30,074
trance in those areas mm-hmm.

456
00:27:30,314 --> 00:27:32,354
How would they have been practice?

457
00:27:32,354 --> 00:27:36,074
Would've they have been everyday people
or would it have been religious people

458
00:27:36,074 --> 00:27:39,340
who would've used trance as a form?

459
00:27:39,735 --> 00:27:44,354
I think in most kind of practices in
our practices, they sometimes they say

460
00:27:44,354 --> 00:27:49,004
there's a kind of calling, so they, you
recognize, even here you hear people say,

461
00:27:49,004 --> 00:27:50,625
you know, if I don't dance I'm nothing.

462
00:27:51,135 --> 00:27:54,675
So they know their dancer from
the start or painter or writer.

463
00:27:55,094 --> 00:28:00,584
So there's a kind of calling and
then there is in the refined work.

464
00:28:01,140 --> 00:28:05,400
Or the palace, they learn from
childhood or the gestures, you

465
00:28:05,400 --> 00:28:07,170
know, and very precise, you know.

466
00:28:07,350 --> 00:28:11,490
And from that very precise
structure comes improvisation.

467
00:28:11,700 --> 00:28:14,880
So the idea of improvising is
different from the animal side,

468
00:28:14,970 --> 00:28:17,250
which actually anybody can go into.

469
00:28:17,310 --> 00:28:20,460
So it's a kind of authenticity, but
they have a kind of physical base.

470
00:28:21,284 --> 00:28:24,435
Because it's very physical, so
they start with martial arts,

471
00:28:24,435 --> 00:28:25,610
so there's a groundedness.

472
00:28:26,085 --> 00:28:30,615
So, and martial arts is a very good
practice for a lot of young people anyway.

473
00:28:30,945 --> 00:28:35,475
You know, it's a very healthy form,
but it grounds them physically and

474
00:28:35,475 --> 00:28:40,155
also maybe psychologically, because
they also have the system of respect.

475
00:28:40,155 --> 00:28:43,514
Because it seems to me, when you're
explaining that, it doesn't seem

476
00:28:43,514 --> 00:28:48,885
that you can really separate trance
as a form of practice from being,

477
00:28:48,945 --> 00:28:53,294
it's a physical thing, but it seems
like it has to be directly connected

478
00:28:53,294 --> 00:28:56,745
to where you are psychologically.

479
00:28:56,925 --> 00:28:57,284
Yeah.

480
00:28:57,430 --> 00:28:57,649
But.

481
00:28:58,225 --> 00:29:00,655
Nonetheless, they are one society.

482
00:29:00,775 --> 00:29:05,725
You know, like one end of society is the
lower rung economically, and the other is

483
00:29:05,725 --> 00:29:11,455
a very high rung that you can say whatever
high and low means, or it is, doesn't

484
00:29:11,455 --> 00:29:14,035
matter, like low, is it equal as high?

485
00:29:14,215 --> 00:29:17,215
Then you see them as
one entity of necessity.

486
00:29:17,215 --> 00:29:21,085
You know, like the elements of
negative and positive for yin and yang.

487
00:29:21,085 --> 00:29:22,945
So this comes through the society.

488
00:29:23,275 --> 00:29:24,295
You cannot separate.

489
00:29:24,295 --> 00:29:29,275
So rulers have to rule, you
know, workers have to serve.

490
00:29:29,635 --> 00:29:34,255
So it just gives you an
idea of how they practice.

491
00:29:34,435 --> 00:29:38,335
To give example, one of the
interview I did for both.

492
00:29:39,855 --> 00:29:46,665
So the princess who I work with and
then the head of the Borons I work with

493
00:29:46,754 --> 00:29:51,584
in the animal area, he says that the
young people in that area had a kind of

494
00:29:51,584 --> 00:29:57,105
lethargy, lethargic and no enthusiasm
for life, and they taking to drinks

495
00:29:57,105 --> 00:29:59,564
and drugs and become social problem.

496
00:29:59,715 --> 00:30:05,774
And so he reintroduced that from dreams
and Constitution and he was brought

497
00:30:05,774 --> 00:30:09,465
into a very low part of his life also.

498
00:30:09,675 --> 00:30:11,745
And that is a moment when things change.

499
00:30:12,014 --> 00:30:18,705
And he introduced this practice that was
ancestrally there from his ancestors,

500
00:30:18,975 --> 00:30:21,975
but he was stopped by the colonist power.

501
00:30:22,004 --> 00:30:23,895
And then so when it slowly.

502
00:30:24,210 --> 00:30:28,320
He brought it back from
dreams and it took momentum.

503
00:30:28,320 --> 00:30:31,530
And within five years he had a
lot of resistance, especially from

504
00:30:31,530 --> 00:30:35,760
the Islamic kind of area, say,
this is not the right practice.

505
00:30:35,760 --> 00:30:36,210
They want.

506
00:30:36,660 --> 00:30:41,760
Not all, because they assimilate
into some link now and now.

507
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:47,700
So he said the young people are full of
energy, you know, and enthusiasm for life.

508
00:30:47,880 --> 00:30:52,530
So they need this area of
practice, they need this area.

509
00:30:52,950 --> 00:30:55,980
And I don't think there is
an area that you let out.

510
00:30:57,180 --> 00:30:59,850
Sometimes people say express
and that, I don't think so.

511
00:30:59,850 --> 00:31:03,450
I think it's a necessity to
actually, it goes both ways.

512
00:31:03,690 --> 00:31:11,010
It needs an intensity, and the intensity
is like the life force of life itself.

513
00:31:11,610 --> 00:31:14,399
You know, like the boat of
lightning is kind of what they

514
00:31:14,399 --> 00:31:16,290
use in the whip for the animal.

515
00:31:16,770 --> 00:31:21,389
But then when you go to the mesmeric,
high level of France, you know,

516
00:31:21,389 --> 00:31:23,879
like underneath it's a lot of.

517
00:31:24,945 --> 00:31:29,145
Suffering and hard work as well
is just two different languages.

518
00:31:29,145 --> 00:31:33,585
You know, you want to give up so
quickly because it's so tedious and

519
00:31:33,585 --> 00:31:38,895
so, you know, to actually carry on
takes incredible inner strength.

520
00:31:39,135 --> 00:31:42,435
So you have this physical outer
strength and inner strength, and you

521
00:31:42,465 --> 00:31:45,435
see animal God as one entity really.

522
00:31:46,004 --> 00:31:50,534
So when I did the dance, it was actually
accidental because at the end of my

523
00:31:50,534 --> 00:31:54,375
PhD I actually had this idea of a
performance I wanted to do, but because

524
00:31:54,375 --> 00:31:56,294
of the lockdown, I couldn't do it.

525
00:31:56,655 --> 00:32:01,215
And then I heard the news from
the composer, XiO boss, so who

526
00:32:01,485 --> 00:32:04,215
wrote the music just passed away.

527
00:32:04,544 --> 00:32:09,435
I had met him not too far away, and it
felt like, oh, you know, this lockdown.

528
00:32:09,645 --> 00:32:13,034
And then I just put the music
down like, like a little speaker.

529
00:32:13,574 --> 00:32:17,985
Put his music and then record
it and then it went viral even,

530
00:32:18,135 --> 00:32:20,925
you know, and 70,000 viewers.

531
00:32:22,544 --> 00:32:24,824
And this was in Abbotsford
convent, wasn't it?

532
00:32:24,824 --> 00:32:27,810
It was just a nearby, a window and yeah,

533
00:32:28,040 --> 00:32:29,010
just on a wall.

534
00:32:29,235 --> 00:32:33,584
And I didn't move very much like, so, you
know, it was like a square meter spot.

535
00:32:33,824 --> 00:32:39,014
And how was that for someone who
has spent their entire life within.

536
00:32:39,290 --> 00:32:41,510
The arts and perfecting their practice.

537
00:32:41,510 --> 00:32:46,610
And to find that you went viral for
something that you just did offer, you

538
00:32:46,610 --> 00:32:50,810
know, how you were, feelings, how to
express yourself, and it wasn't, you

539
00:32:50,810 --> 00:32:54,379
know, choreographed or wasn't really
thought of that much in the lighting or

540
00:32:54,379 --> 00:32:56,360
anything like that, and it just went off.

541
00:32:56,389 --> 00:32:57,139
How was that?

542
00:32:57,139 --> 00:33:01,399
It was surreal in the sense that I
didn't know how you look at numbers

543
00:33:01,399 --> 00:33:05,060
and you can't understand it because
it, it can all digital, it's different

544
00:33:05,060 --> 00:33:06,620
when somebody tells you life.

545
00:33:06,625 --> 00:33:06,794
Mm.

546
00:33:07,094 --> 00:33:07,314
You

547
00:33:07,314 --> 00:33:07,395
know?

548
00:33:07,395 --> 00:33:09,979
And then you see the numbers
flicking and you say, wow,

549
00:33:10,040 --> 00:33:11,389
you know, what does that mean?

550
00:33:11,750 --> 00:33:13,939
So there's a lot of people writing to me.

551
00:33:13,939 --> 00:33:15,350
So it was quite interesting.

552
00:33:15,350 --> 00:33:16,429
That part was interesting.

553
00:33:16,610 --> 00:33:21,530
And usually it says this, they're the
dancers and the actors say, look how

554
00:33:21,530 --> 00:33:23,675
physical you can be and tell story.

555
00:33:23,675 --> 00:33:27,709
And the dancer say, look how critical
and dramatic a dancer can be.

556
00:33:28,159 --> 00:33:30,560
And so in this two disciplines, I see.

557
00:33:30,740 --> 00:33:33,080
You know, and then it went viral.

558
00:33:33,080 --> 00:33:33,110
I.

559
00:33:33,719 --> 00:33:38,310
Around the Latin countries, like,
you know, you went to Italy and then

560
00:33:38,310 --> 00:33:41,370
to South America, but not to Asia.

561
00:33:41,370 --> 00:33:43,860
It was quite interesting,
like Asia so used to,

562
00:33:47,639 --> 00:33:51,449
but also maybe the music was very western.

563
00:33:51,540 --> 00:33:55,679
I mean, so the music was called, you
know, uncondition Following a Bird.

564
00:33:56,070 --> 00:34:00,090
And that was a very beautiful experience
because I didn't choreograph, I

565
00:34:00,090 --> 00:34:01,949
didn't prepare myself for the dance.

566
00:34:02,070 --> 00:34:05,010
The song was six minutes,
14 seconds, and that was it.

567
00:34:05,610 --> 00:34:07,949
I put the song on and
I just let my body go.

568
00:34:07,949 --> 00:34:14,009
And I just remembered how the whole
sense of psychological, longing,

569
00:34:14,100 --> 00:34:19,529
emptiness, or this very sense of being
locked down and it's global, right?

570
00:34:19,529 --> 00:34:24,900
So it's quite powerful feeling, you know,
of somebody dying, you know, and then, and

571
00:34:24,900 --> 00:34:26,819
you do not know whether it's said or not.

572
00:34:26,940 --> 00:34:30,359
It's just even somebody dying
quite surreal because, you

573
00:34:30,359 --> 00:34:32,009
know, it's, he was in Italy.

574
00:34:32,835 --> 00:34:36,404
It's like if you didn't see
him die, you think he's still

575
00:34:36,404 --> 00:34:38,114
alive in some other aspect.

576
00:34:38,774 --> 00:34:43,154
So when the music came in, it was a direct
communication from the music to the body.

577
00:34:43,154 --> 00:34:47,279
I. And it's told me something
that I never thought before.

578
00:34:47,279 --> 00:34:48,509
What was in the title?

579
00:34:48,870 --> 00:34:53,460
Because I think XiO wrote the music
in the last stages of his life

580
00:34:53,850 --> 00:34:55,560
when he had the tumor, the brain.

581
00:34:55,620 --> 00:34:58,410
And I can just imagine,
what am I gonna do right?

582
00:34:58,440 --> 00:35:01,830
Am I gonna die and I going
to operation come out?

583
00:35:01,890 --> 00:35:07,230
And so this uncertainty of the last
anesthetic, like maybe I won't wake up.

584
00:35:07,919 --> 00:35:11,924
So he did survive the first
operation and stuff like that.

585
00:35:11,970 --> 00:35:15,960
And then he did perform quite
miraculously after that.

586
00:35:16,080 --> 00:35:17,250
'cause he could hardly move.

587
00:35:17,250 --> 00:35:18,450
But then he played the piano.

588
00:35:18,450 --> 00:35:19,020
It was smooth.

589
00:35:19,230 --> 00:35:23,399
So the idea came to me when I was
dancing, the music that he revealed to

590
00:35:23,399 --> 00:35:27,870
me that it's like a spirit, like the
bird was a spirit that he was following.

591
00:35:28,200 --> 00:35:32,640
Where he's so confused, he just
let it go and just say, I'm

592
00:35:32,640 --> 00:35:34,410
gonna follow you unconditionally.

593
00:35:34,410 --> 00:35:38,879
Like, you know, it's like, but also
the word uncondition to me, knowing

594
00:35:38,940 --> 00:35:40,770
I feel it's like it's a word.

595
00:35:41,080 --> 00:35:46,360
To mean love, you know, because
love is an unconditioned area.

596
00:35:46,360 --> 00:35:48,520
There's nothing can be conditional.

597
00:35:48,970 --> 00:35:52,240
A lot of people talk about falling
out of love, which I never understood,

598
00:35:52,690 --> 00:35:56,680
you know, because it's like a
condition, you know, like, and so it

599
00:35:56,680 --> 00:35:59,110
is that part that opens up something.

600
00:35:59,200 --> 00:36:04,150
And then that spirit of a bird,
I could almost feel that I was

601
00:36:04,150 --> 00:36:06,580
following the same bird in the music.

602
00:36:06,760 --> 00:36:13,030
And so like a musician, and I've danced
it actually before, he can take you to

603
00:36:13,030 --> 00:36:20,200
heights that you think you're flying,
but then it takes so much out of you that

604
00:36:20,200 --> 00:36:26,530
you have to come down, like, you know,
had to find this base back to humanity.

605
00:36:26,530 --> 00:36:29,710
And I think usually that coming
down affects the audience.

606
00:36:29,710 --> 00:36:33,960
I. It feels like this amazing state
and then how to drop back into this

607
00:36:34,170 --> 00:36:35,610
little body of yours, you know?

608
00:36:35,610 --> 00:36:40,320
So that itself is the language of
ecstasy, is the language of, yeah.

609
00:36:40,410 --> 00:36:44,520
All that intensity of life
and death and euphoria.

610
00:36:44,580 --> 00:36:48,120
The kind of all beautiful qualities
of what a theater should be, right?

611
00:36:49,170 --> 00:36:51,045
Or listen to music or any art form.

612
00:36:51,435 --> 00:36:55,500
It's really beautiful because you know,
in just over the six minutes you managed

613
00:36:55,500 --> 00:36:58,020
to convey all of that so beautifully.

614
00:36:58,140 --> 00:37:03,060
I felt I was just being empty,
like something took over me.

615
00:37:03,240 --> 00:37:07,670
So I felt that I. At the moment, in any
other situations, when I feel that I

616
00:37:07,670 --> 00:37:12,140
want to hang or I want to choreograph,
I wouldn't have achieved that clarity.

617
00:37:12,259 --> 00:37:16,819
So it's not so much me dancing, it's
something dancing through me, and

618
00:37:16,819 --> 00:37:18,589
all I have to do is to be empty.

619
00:37:18,589 --> 00:37:23,299
It's not hard to empty oneself,
which is a metaphor for me for death.

620
00:37:23,390 --> 00:37:28,549
You know, it's an departure from
an ego state to empty oneself.

621
00:37:28,759 --> 00:37:32,509
Unless you're empty, something
cannot take over like a mediumship.

622
00:37:33,440 --> 00:37:38,180
And so that is a lot of preference
that to life, is that even in any

623
00:37:38,180 --> 00:37:42,200
religion, you know, talking about
surrendering your life, so to speak,

624
00:37:42,650 --> 00:37:46,910
your ego so that God can be present.

625
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:48,799
And that is an understanding.

626
00:37:48,799 --> 00:37:54,710
So it happened because the emotion was
there, and I wouldn't say it's grief

627
00:37:54,710 --> 00:37:56,029
because it wasn't sad or anything.

628
00:37:56,029 --> 00:37:58,730
It was just a kind of shock.

629
00:37:59,160 --> 00:38:03,240
It's a kind of wonder, which by the way
is what, when we are talking about the

630
00:38:03,240 --> 00:38:08,400
wound before the theme of the work and
like nature before it's a German word

631
00:38:08,490 --> 00:38:12,360
come from German, which means wonderful.

632
00:38:12,870 --> 00:38:16,710
So the wound itself is a
wonder is a place or something.

633
00:38:16,710 --> 00:38:17,310
Wonderful.

634
00:38:17,520 --> 00:38:20,550
And that's a current work you're
working on now, isn't it, Tony?

635
00:38:20,550 --> 00:38:23,940
Can you tell us a little bit about
that and how it originated and

636
00:38:23,940 --> 00:38:25,530
how it's actually taking form?

637
00:38:25,680 --> 00:38:26,190
Yes.

638
00:38:26,610 --> 00:38:33,240
I mean I got a residency two weeks
in Queenstown last year in Tasmania.

639
00:38:33,360 --> 00:38:38,430
And it is known for a place of
mining, like a mining town and also

640
00:38:38,850 --> 00:38:41,250
at one stage a big mining disaster.

641
00:38:41,430 --> 00:38:47,045
And it's one of the most exploited place
in the world like, like huge area just

642
00:38:47,045 --> 00:38:49,530
disappeared, like a big hole, you know?

643
00:38:49,530 --> 00:38:51,660
And the river still bleeds.

644
00:38:51,900 --> 00:38:54,870
It still orange from every time it rains.

645
00:38:54,870 --> 00:38:56,460
And they say it'll never heal.

646
00:38:57,000 --> 00:38:58,200
And I dunno how.

647
00:38:59,100 --> 00:39:02,550
And I mean, you know, I can't
comprehend that something doesn't heal.

648
00:39:03,060 --> 00:39:06,510
But then when you read about any kind
of philosophical ideas of the wound,

649
00:39:06,810 --> 00:39:12,360
of the existential wound, what makes
it existential is that it never heals.

650
00:39:12,630 --> 00:39:17,940
So this idea of suffering, this idea
of being born is already suffering.

651
00:39:18,120 --> 00:39:23,400
And so, so it's a beautiful idea of
how one goes with the other side.

652
00:39:23,850 --> 00:39:25,650
The wound is wonderful, right?

653
00:39:25,650 --> 00:39:28,890
So physically it's
beautiful psychologically.

654
00:39:29,100 --> 00:39:31,440
How do I move, how it affects my body?

655
00:39:31,650 --> 00:39:36,030
And emotionally, I mean also
historically, and I don't understand,

656
00:39:36,090 --> 00:39:39,660
'cause two weeks that I see the
local people and how it affects them.

657
00:39:40,110 --> 00:39:43,590
Different categories of people,
not the artists, but just

658
00:39:43,590 --> 00:39:45,270
people walking around and how.

659
00:39:46,319 --> 00:39:47,970
Their ancestors have lived there.

660
00:39:48,029 --> 00:39:52,230
And nowadays there's still some
mining, but it's very technical.

661
00:39:52,439 --> 00:39:56,279
You know, we went in the tunnel,
we drove 12 kilometers underground,

662
00:39:56,370 --> 00:39:57,509
like drove 12 kilometers.

663
00:39:57,629 --> 00:39:57,689
Wow.

664
00:39:58,290 --> 00:39:58,919
Under the horse.

665
00:39:59,100 --> 00:40:04,379
So it's a fascinating kind of concept, but
in those days it's very narrow and where

666
00:40:04,830 --> 00:40:10,529
they can get gas and collapse and all that
kind of, you know, which actually happen.

667
00:40:10,589 --> 00:40:16,259
And so how the museums still portray
those psychological things, not to mention

668
00:40:16,259 --> 00:40:18,415
the wealth that came with it, you know?

669
00:40:18,415 --> 00:40:18,814
Mm-hmm.

670
00:40:18,915 --> 00:40:19,254
And then

671
00:40:19,254 --> 00:40:24,930
the railway line and the, you can see the
old buildings have a kind of a granular,

672
00:40:25,049 --> 00:40:29,370
so it is kind of strange wound and I feel.

673
00:40:29,700 --> 00:40:33,660
It's quite a beautiful, I dunno
how to perform that, but it links.

674
00:40:33,870 --> 00:40:35,340
So that's how it started.

675
00:40:35,490 --> 00:40:40,230
I called the wood, you know, and
then the body wise, I got Jack the

676
00:40:40,230 --> 00:40:42,870
other dancer to be like Sebastian.

677
00:40:42,870 --> 00:40:45,240
So I was thinking about how,
you know, shooting in Arrow.

678
00:40:45,390 --> 00:40:49,980
So there's also this structural
references in the past about Saints,

679
00:40:51,360 --> 00:40:55,230
how, yeah, what gets, you know, so I
think this is kind of more than Saint to

680
00:40:55,320 --> 00:40:57,750
hear and then somehow for some reason.

681
00:40:57,970 --> 00:40:59,050
In that link.

682
00:40:59,110 --> 00:41:03,850
I also was possibly working
in the Masa, which is in swe.

683
00:41:04,690 --> 00:41:08,860
And if you know about Robert Wilson's
book of Illegal, it is the Story of

684
00:41:08,860 --> 00:41:13,570
Creation by the fifth Gender shamans,
which called themselves the bi.

685
00:41:14,470 --> 00:41:15,940
So they have five genders, right?

686
00:41:15,940 --> 00:41:19,960
So the Cismen, the ciswomen, trans
men, trans women, and then they

687
00:41:19,960 --> 00:41:23,830
have the non-gender, non-binary,
and they are at the shamans.

688
00:41:23,830 --> 00:41:26,529
The beginning of the story
of creation is about them.

689
00:41:27,160 --> 00:41:29,230
So they live in three realms.

690
00:41:29,230 --> 00:41:29,529
The upper world.

691
00:41:30,100 --> 00:41:33,190
The middle world, which is where
we are, and the underworld.

692
00:41:33,820 --> 00:41:37,270
So it's an interesting link
for me and all my research, you

693
00:41:37,270 --> 00:41:39,160
know, it does to this new area.

694
00:41:39,640 --> 00:41:41,259
And he's only 22 years old, right?

695
00:41:41,320 --> 00:41:42,130
He's a farmer.

696
00:41:42,130 --> 00:41:47,500
He plants rice and he goes to the
university a bit like PCA is an

697
00:41:47,500 --> 00:41:49,180
arts, you know, he does dance.

698
00:41:49,865 --> 00:41:53,645
And then he's a 22-year-old,
21st century person.

699
00:41:53,705 --> 00:41:57,785
And I thought, well, what's gonna
be the future of this person?

700
00:41:57,785 --> 00:41:58,055
Right.

701
00:41:58,115 --> 00:41:58,955
It's quite interesting.

702
00:41:58,955 --> 00:41:59,225
So,

703
00:41:59,320 --> 00:42:02,045
and is this Jack the other dancer
that you are with or No, this

704
00:42:02,045 --> 00:42:02,705
is an cha.

705
00:42:02,975 --> 00:42:06,905
So Jack is Australian dancer, so
I'm bringing both of them together,

706
00:42:07,265 --> 00:42:11,825
this west and this will, and so
the last week I came back and we

707
00:42:11,825 --> 00:42:16,415
had one week, this collaborative
part to see how we can go further.

708
00:42:16,895 --> 00:42:18,035
So this is the next stage.

709
00:42:18,035 --> 00:42:18,305
So.

710
00:42:19,080 --> 00:42:23,669
That part of the project is called
Climbing the Rain, or which is because

711
00:42:23,669 --> 00:42:25,680
they have no word for impossible.

712
00:42:25,830 --> 00:42:30,000
So they have this word of explaining
how a ton of impossibility, so

713
00:42:30,000 --> 00:42:31,980
you say, I'm climbing the rain.

714
00:42:31,980 --> 00:42:36,149
So you know it's possible and is
not possible at the same time.

715
00:42:36,240 --> 00:42:40,319
I love that it just evokes
such good imagery as well.

716
00:42:40,325 --> 00:42:40,605
It does.

717
00:42:40,740 --> 00:42:45,149
It is kind of like a futile act
is climbing the rain, but at the

718
00:42:45,149 --> 00:42:48,044
same time, maybe you could, I

719
00:42:48,044 --> 00:42:49,084
dunno, like really?

720
00:42:49,230 --> 00:42:49,980
You totally can.

721
00:42:49,980 --> 00:42:50,730
Yeah.

722
00:42:50,730 --> 00:42:50,790
Yeah.

723
00:42:51,209 --> 00:42:52,765
And that's why it is beautiful.

724
00:42:53,339 --> 00:42:55,890
And so these two projects come together.

725
00:42:55,950 --> 00:42:57,180
It will have these two sides.

726
00:42:57,180 --> 00:43:01,350
So I call it like a dip, teach, like,
you know, to part of a panel, but

727
00:43:01,350 --> 00:43:03,720
it's that, I call it the wounded ring.

728
00:43:03,720 --> 00:43:03,779
Wow.

729
00:43:04,020 --> 00:43:08,370
Which is the idea of a poem
that the director of the Writers

730
00:43:08,459 --> 00:43:10,770
International Writers Festival.

731
00:43:11,205 --> 00:43:14,024
He wrote a poem and he's
put this two together.

732
00:43:14,205 --> 00:43:15,674
And so that would be the third stage.

733
00:43:15,705 --> 00:43:19,694
This is what I'm applying for
now to be perform in October.

734
00:43:20,024 --> 00:43:24,615
So with this two deep teach
should come to one work.

735
00:43:25,365 --> 00:43:26,834
I dunno how he's gonna be.

736
00:43:26,834 --> 00:43:30,645
I mean, I got a great musician,
I got, you know, and I'm just

737
00:43:30,645 --> 00:43:32,654
going to ex play and explore.

738
00:43:33,254 --> 00:43:39,015
But the theme of intensity, the body,
the music is all gonna be there.

739
00:43:39,705 --> 00:43:43,365
The how to work with a young
who doesn't speak very much.

740
00:43:43,365 --> 00:43:47,504
English is an intercultural
challenge, but.

741
00:43:47,865 --> 00:43:52,605
A wonderful opportunity that they've
given me because maybe I sit in that

742
00:43:52,605 --> 00:43:58,575
position, I understand where Anja comes
from, like where I came from in my past.

743
00:43:58,575 --> 00:44:03,734
And I felt that you cannot take
any normal kind of methods to

744
00:44:03,734 --> 00:44:05,955
collaborate with someone like Anja.

745
00:44:06,435 --> 00:44:12,254
You have to just let somebody
emerge and listen and see, you know?

746
00:44:12,345 --> 00:44:15,915
So that's a very big unknown,
which is kind of trans itself,

747
00:44:16,365 --> 00:44:21,960
which requires a faith or a kind
of a. Non-striving certainty.

748
00:44:22,620 --> 00:44:28,020
It seems to be very universal
emotions and topics, physicality

749
00:44:28,020 --> 00:44:28,890
that you're dealing with.

750
00:44:28,890 --> 00:44:32,250
Tony, people only do that when they
feel like that they're in a safe space.

751
00:44:32,310 --> 00:44:37,380
So how do you create a safe space
for people like Anja, who is bsu,

752
00:44:37,920 --> 00:44:42,330
you know, how do you then make him
and Jack feel safe in the same space?

753
00:44:42,510 --> 00:44:44,190
Well, they find it themselves.

754
00:44:44,190 --> 00:44:44,520
Really.

755
00:44:44,520 --> 00:44:45,870
I just try to recognize it.

756
00:44:45,960 --> 00:44:48,150
The theater is a radio, a safe space.

757
00:44:48,480 --> 00:44:53,760
'cause theater is when you go in
to dwell into this world and then

758
00:44:53,760 --> 00:44:55,410
the moment you clap, it's over.

759
00:44:56,040 --> 00:44:58,410
So it is, it's definite ritual, you know?

760
00:44:58,710 --> 00:45:02,550
And the trouble is sometimes
theater becomes entertaining

761
00:45:02,550 --> 00:45:05,010
area and so you lack that.

762
00:45:05,250 --> 00:45:08,730
I mean, entertainment is good,
but when you come to the area of.

763
00:45:09,234 --> 00:45:14,605
The human psyche, then it needs a
certain depth of understanding, right?

764
00:45:14,694 --> 00:45:16,765
And so how to create that space.

765
00:45:16,944 --> 00:45:20,785
It's like saying, I call it the great
square, like, you know, you can step into

766
00:45:20,785 --> 00:45:22,194
this square and you can lose yourself.

767
00:45:22,615 --> 00:45:24,775
The moment you step a square,
you're back to the world.

768
00:45:25,464 --> 00:45:31,200
So it gives a kind of strange demarcation,
like even not thinking that, you know,

769
00:45:31,464 --> 00:45:33,444
that there's this two space, you know?

770
00:45:33,714 --> 00:45:40,734
So you draw the kind of boundaries around
this subconsciously, the safety is always

771
00:45:40,734 --> 00:45:42,805
the benevolent kind of approach you have.

772
00:45:43,555 --> 00:45:47,755
If you have a bad intention, then
doesn't matter what you do, you know?

773
00:45:48,265 --> 00:45:53,964
I suppose what bad for an actor
could be like, I want to be famous.

774
00:45:54,055 --> 00:45:56,575
I want to get money,
or something like that.

775
00:45:56,725 --> 00:46:01,134
Not that famous fortune is a bad
thing, but it happens to you, right?

776
00:46:01,464 --> 00:46:05,484
But if you go out to seek it, it's
a different area or together, then

777
00:46:05,484 --> 00:46:06,805
it has to be very manipulative.

778
00:46:07,225 --> 00:46:08,560
So this is the area of.

779
00:46:09,210 --> 00:46:10,890
Killing that ego side.

780
00:46:11,430 --> 00:46:16,560
So you are linked immediately with all
humankind, not to a kind of subject

781
00:46:16,560 --> 00:46:19,500
to a material methods of living.

782
00:46:19,560 --> 00:46:24,540
You know, like then your reach is,
I think that wealth is an energetic

783
00:46:24,540 --> 00:46:26,279
thing, not a material thing.

784
00:46:26,670 --> 00:46:28,950
And so this falls in that area.

785
00:46:29,009 --> 00:46:35,040
And I imagine that I keep reminding
myself how to go to the safety area.

786
00:46:35,040 --> 00:46:38,940
So when you have that in mind,
that area of trance is safe.

787
00:46:39,600 --> 00:46:42,180
People think that what if
I'm possessed by something?

788
00:46:42,180 --> 00:46:45,569
I don't want to come into me if
it's a valid question because then

789
00:46:45,600 --> 00:46:49,140
they understand that deep trance is
that you lose control altogether,

790
00:46:49,680 --> 00:46:51,180
that something can control you.

791
00:46:51,359 --> 00:46:55,649
But unless I, it is definitely, I
mean, in kind of new, I mean if you

792
00:46:55,649 --> 00:46:58,740
are in psychosis, you don't have to
do anything is you're already there.

793
00:46:59,970 --> 00:47:00,359
You know?

794
00:47:00,750 --> 00:47:01,200
Yeah.

795
00:47:01,205 --> 00:47:01,225
Yeah.

796
00:47:01,245 --> 00:47:04,830
So, so how to get yourself
out of the psychotic state is

797
00:47:04,830 --> 00:47:06,600
a whole lot of methodology.

798
00:47:06,689 --> 00:47:14,430
I think the methods of theater, the
effects of art is powerful in their part.

799
00:47:14,430 --> 00:47:18,000
When it is in anything, like
sometimes even reading a

800
00:47:18,149 --> 00:47:20,160
poetry can change you, right?

801
00:47:20,700 --> 00:47:24,210
After reading something, you say,
no, I'm never gonna be that again.

802
00:47:24,779 --> 00:47:26,730
And this transformation things happen.

803
00:47:26,730 --> 00:47:29,310
And so art is natural, necess sense.

804
00:47:29,520 --> 00:47:31,770
Not that you have to do
art, it just happens.

805
00:47:32,160 --> 00:47:33,870
It's a bit like breathing.

806
00:47:34,049 --> 00:47:35,910
I think art is necessary.

807
00:47:36,540 --> 00:47:38,970
It's part of every culture has that.

808
00:47:39,360 --> 00:47:39,930
Rituals.

809
00:47:40,530 --> 00:47:40,830
Yeah.

810
00:47:40,830 --> 00:47:43,800
And that's what I was going to
ask is about what do you think

811
00:47:43,980 --> 00:47:46,650
the importance of the rituals are?

812
00:47:46,650 --> 00:47:49,650
'cause it seems to be something that
we keep coming back to is ritual.

813
00:47:49,770 --> 00:47:49,950
Mm-hmm.

814
00:47:50,010 --> 00:47:53,850
And how important is that
to be part of the practice?

815
00:47:54,270 --> 00:47:58,680
Does that help with putting
you in a certain state?

816
00:47:58,770 --> 00:47:59,250
Does it?

817
00:47:59,250 --> 00:48:04,290
Certainly, as an audience member, I
know that the ritual of going to see

818
00:48:04,290 --> 00:48:07,620
a performance, you do put yourself
in a state so you're more open.

819
00:48:07,920 --> 00:48:10,950
And like you said, I like the
clapping, is when you actually know

820
00:48:10,950 --> 00:48:12,420
that's the end and that's, you know,

821
00:48:12,510 --> 00:48:12,840
yes.

822
00:48:12,900 --> 00:48:14,160
You're back into reality.

823
00:48:14,220 --> 00:48:14,400
Yes.

824
00:48:14,580 --> 00:48:17,910
What rituals do you practice
and think that are an important

825
00:48:17,910 --> 00:48:19,350
to the work that you do, Tony?

826
00:48:19,440 --> 00:48:23,190
Well, as a performer, I have this
sense of understanding how much I can

827
00:48:23,190 --> 00:48:26,010
empty myself, you know, divide myself.

828
00:48:26,010 --> 00:48:30,600
There's always the concept, the
ideas, but what diff differentiates

829
00:48:30,600 --> 00:48:32,370
that is that they give you.

830
00:48:32,794 --> 00:48:34,625
A doorway into something.

831
00:48:35,345 --> 00:48:37,834
But this something is
always the same thing.

832
00:48:38,285 --> 00:48:41,705
You know, it is always a
psychological state, but sometimes

833
00:48:42,035 --> 00:48:45,455
for different audience they
need different entrance space.

834
00:48:45,814 --> 00:48:50,765
So for the people who do one thing and
who do the borons, they don't need much.

835
00:48:51,004 --> 00:48:52,084
Everybody knows it.

836
00:48:52,145 --> 00:48:52,745
You go there.

837
00:48:52,895 --> 00:48:55,654
But for the foreigner goes,
they say, what's it all about?

838
00:48:56,404 --> 00:49:00,035
What's the same both ways, you know,
you bring that over here and you

839
00:49:00,035 --> 00:49:01,865
know, and it becomes an exhaust thing.

840
00:49:01,865 --> 00:49:05,915
So it loses its effect of what
it does for its own people.

841
00:49:06,245 --> 00:49:12,395
So to me that is what is important
for me to create this way of entering

842
00:49:12,634 --> 00:49:16,415
into this, I dunno, this something
that's never been there before.

843
00:49:16,415 --> 00:49:18,484
They call it like, like esis, right?

844
00:49:19,024 --> 00:49:20,975
Something natural.

845
00:49:21,484 --> 00:49:23,464
Like something that would just happen.

846
00:49:23,705 --> 00:49:26,314
The flowing of the water,
the falling of the leaves.

847
00:49:26,705 --> 00:49:30,305
That's kind of what they
mean by something static too.

848
00:49:30,885 --> 00:49:33,855
Getting out of static ecstasis.

849
00:49:33,855 --> 00:49:35,805
So we know those blockages.

850
00:49:35,985 --> 00:49:37,545
We just want to unblock things.

851
00:49:37,935 --> 00:49:40,155
And in light it's always there.

852
00:49:40,155 --> 00:49:43,335
So it's constant flow
of blocking unblocking.

853
00:49:43,665 --> 00:49:45,885
And so rituals are
important in that sense.

854
00:49:45,945 --> 00:49:51,735
Rituals are habits of unblocking,
you know, of keeping in tune.

855
00:49:51,735 --> 00:49:56,835
Once I always to the source, I say
the source also hesitant 'cause I

856
00:49:56,835 --> 00:49:58,455
don't really know what the source is.

857
00:49:58,815 --> 00:49:59,595
But you know what?

858
00:49:59,775 --> 00:50:03,075
When you're not, when you
are ill, when you're blocked.

859
00:50:03,255 --> 00:50:04,905
And what has this taught you about?

860
00:50:05,235 --> 00:50:09,195
What has your practice and working
with different styles and looking how

861
00:50:09,195 --> 00:50:15,135
different cultures around the world
have used their different methods?

862
00:50:15,435 --> 00:50:15,525
Mm-hmm.

863
00:50:15,765 --> 00:50:18,345
What has that taught you about mortality?

864
00:50:18,465 --> 00:50:18,645
Yeah.

865
00:50:19,215 --> 00:50:23,235
The mortality is, I mean, first
it links to humans, right?

866
00:50:23,235 --> 00:50:25,785
I mean, and then humankind is very.

867
00:50:26,865 --> 00:50:27,404
Hard.

868
00:50:27,464 --> 00:50:32,475
So you go to, you see beggars, you
see people on the streets asking for

869
00:50:32,475 --> 00:50:36,645
money and you, you know, and you say
what this kind of different society I

870
00:50:36,645 --> 00:50:40,274
come from in Australia, in Melbourne,
I mean there are still people asking

871
00:50:40,274 --> 00:50:44,924
money here, but there are different
levels of asking for something, right?

872
00:50:45,375 --> 00:50:48,600
And you know, there are
limitations to access.

873
00:50:49,544 --> 00:50:51,975
So I feel that is an understanding.

874
00:50:52,125 --> 00:50:56,924
What I've learned about
death is being human first.

875
00:50:57,615 --> 00:50:59,714
Like we all die.

876
00:51:00,765 --> 00:51:05,055
That's one of the truths, you
know, that that doesn't change.

877
00:51:05,595 --> 00:51:07,995
And so I do not know what value is.

878
00:51:08,024 --> 00:51:12,044
Maybe people think that you can
make value of something, but I

879
00:51:12,044 --> 00:51:14,115
think value is already there.

880
00:51:14,714 --> 00:51:15,825
The moment you're born.

881
00:51:16,365 --> 00:51:18,435
It is just looking at ways of.

882
00:51:18,825 --> 00:51:25,215
Being that just show you the value, no
matter if you are lame or you are sick

883
00:51:25,305 --> 00:51:28,845
or you are diseased, it's just different.

884
00:51:29,325 --> 00:51:30,795
Well, it's not relative.

885
00:51:31,125 --> 00:51:33,525
It is definitely difference.

886
00:51:33,645 --> 00:51:36,645
It's so, so if you compare,
then it's always a problem,

887
00:51:36,825 --> 00:51:38,145
but it's not the comparison.

888
00:51:38,235 --> 00:51:40,275
We all suffer in certain ways.

889
00:51:40,275 --> 00:51:40,545
Right?

890
00:51:41,055 --> 00:51:41,325
Yeah.

891
00:51:41,565 --> 00:51:42,015
So it's.

892
00:51:42,630 --> 00:51:48,090
It teaches me that perhaps in the long
run how not to fear death, the robot.

893
00:51:48,090 --> 00:51:48,720
I fear death.

894
00:51:48,900 --> 00:51:52,140
Perhaps if it's tomorrow, I
might think about it differently.

895
00:51:55,200 --> 00:51:57,155
That's the thing we don't know, do we, you

896
00:51:57,155 --> 00:51:57,600
know, don't know.

897
00:51:57,600 --> 00:51:57,930
Right.

898
00:51:57,930 --> 00:52:02,070
We can, we can talk about reincarnation,
we can talk about the unknown, about

899
00:52:02,430 --> 00:52:07,830
images, about ideas, but they're just that
beyond the mind is something else, right?

900
00:52:07,830 --> 00:52:09,240
It's just, it's, yeah.

901
00:52:09,240 --> 00:52:13,890
So maybe the wealth of what
I'm doing is getting closer

902
00:52:13,890 --> 00:52:15,780
to under not understanding it.

903
00:52:15,780 --> 00:52:16,680
Just knowing it.

904
00:52:16,715 --> 00:52:21,720
I mean, it is measured by real death
that you know people, you know,

905
00:52:21,720 --> 00:52:26,670
your parents, your friends, and then
other things open up when it happens.

906
00:52:26,670 --> 00:52:26,910
Right?

907
00:52:27,330 --> 00:52:31,080
So many things, and if I wanna
give example, you say, the

908
00:52:31,080 --> 00:52:35,400
moment my mother died, after
that, my memory of her becomes.

909
00:52:35,985 --> 00:52:39,404
Multidimensional, not might,
you know, like she's a child,

910
00:52:39,404 --> 00:52:41,295
she's young woman, you know?

911
00:52:41,295 --> 00:52:44,085
But when she's alive,
it's just an image of her.

912
00:52:44,205 --> 00:52:47,355
When she's alive, you know,
this mom and dad getting old.

913
00:52:47,895 --> 00:52:52,685
Now she can't walk, but after
she's gone, I. It's just so Yeah.

914
00:52:52,775 --> 00:52:56,075
And you dream like you may
yourself, your mother differently.

915
00:52:56,075 --> 00:52:57,905
So this is a beautiful realm.

916
00:52:57,995 --> 00:53:00,125
This is something that I do not know.

917
00:53:00,545 --> 00:53:05,675
It only reveals and so course that's
why I keep performing as a point 'cause

918
00:53:06,005 --> 00:53:10,475
it's not achieving something you just,
part of something becoming itself.

919
00:53:10,475 --> 00:53:10,745
Right.

920
00:53:10,835 --> 00:53:17,165
So that's idea of being and becoming so
that we are not just being us 'cause we

921
00:53:17,165 --> 00:53:21,665
dunno, we actually becoming something we
never known before, constantly becoming.

922
00:53:21,875 --> 00:53:27,725
And I think that is one of the idea of
the loosened, the to in the thousand

923
00:53:27,725 --> 00:53:32,285
plateau as I like that idea of
becoming, you know, so you are always

924
00:53:32,285 --> 00:53:37,025
confronting an uncertainty and then
you get used to, you go to bed with

925
00:53:37,025 --> 00:53:42,545
uncertainty and like it, you know,
like it becomes a comforting area.

926
00:53:42,935 --> 00:53:47,370
It's almost that I. If everything's so
certain, you become quite uncomfortable.

927
00:53:47,460 --> 00:53:50,550
I suppose it comes back to that
reference that you made before about

928
00:53:51,090 --> 00:53:57,180
that potential that you become more
open if you don't have that fear.

929
00:53:57,180 --> 00:54:02,340
And if you are always becoming,
therefore your perception seems to be

930
00:54:02,670 --> 00:54:05,460
more of opportunity and what's out there

931
00:54:05,550 --> 00:54:11,220
or whatever tends to be what you fear
is something you might start to welcome.

932
00:54:11,310 --> 00:54:13,680
You know, say, I don't want that.

933
00:54:14,190 --> 00:54:19,680
And so you kind of like an idea of
how to strive to feel, you know,

934
00:54:20,250 --> 00:54:24,450
how am I gonna feel this quite a
different conceptual twist, you know?

935
00:54:24,480 --> 00:54:29,460
'cause we learn so much now in, in a
few decades on how to achieve this.

936
00:54:29,460 --> 00:54:32,880
How to, you know, let go of
that, this, but maybe it's not,

937
00:54:33,330 --> 00:54:35,730
maybe it's just failure itself.

938
00:54:35,730 --> 00:54:38,790
The dark side of success.

939
00:54:39,660 --> 00:54:41,220
It comes together right.

940
00:54:42,195 --> 00:54:43,785
You cannot have one without the other.

941
00:54:44,085 --> 00:54:45,885
And tell me, you mentioned the Torah.

942
00:54:46,035 --> 00:54:49,575
Can you tell me a little bit more about
that and perhaps our audience about

943
00:54:49,575 --> 00:54:53,175
the people and what their traditions
are and what you've seen and in

944
00:54:53,590 --> 00:54:53,880
Masa?

945
00:54:53,940 --> 00:54:54,161
In Masa?

946
00:54:54,161 --> 00:54:54,162
Yeah.

947
00:54:55,070 --> 00:54:56,865
I've only been there very short time.

948
00:54:56,865 --> 00:55:01,965
I've spent more time in Java in different
past, but then it is a culture that seems

949
00:55:01,965 --> 00:55:07,725
quite familiar to me, is not very much
different from how I was brought up with

950
00:55:07,725 --> 00:55:12,735
my aunties, my grandmother's side, and
they all have magics and things like that.

951
00:55:12,735 --> 00:55:18,015
So I've been to some buildings where
like a little heart and there was this

952
00:55:18,825 --> 00:55:23,295
elderly woman, not too, or elderly, but
she goes into a trance and you have all

953
00:55:23,565 --> 00:55:29,595
incense and food and I'm not scared of
it, but it's quite awesome, you know, or

954
00:55:29,595 --> 00:55:32,685
all inspiring space if you're not afraid.

955
00:55:33,135 --> 00:55:34,425
It's like, what is this?

956
00:55:34,425 --> 00:55:35,385
This is beautiful.

957
00:55:35,445 --> 00:55:38,835
If you look at as a ritual,
you know, because there's

958
00:55:38,835 --> 00:55:40,395
nothing frightening about it.

959
00:55:40,755 --> 00:55:44,235
The only thing that can be frightened
to Westerners is I do not know what

960
00:55:44,235 --> 00:55:48,615
this is, what it can do and brings
out negative things that what if

961
00:55:48,615 --> 00:55:50,475
something happens to me, you know?

962
00:55:50,505 --> 00:55:55,665
But if you don't think it like that, it's
actually quite beautiful performance.

963
00:55:55,785 --> 00:55:57,945
God knows we have crazier
performance in the West.

964
00:56:03,825 --> 00:56:04,125
Yes.

965
00:56:04,125 --> 00:56:09,375
I'm sure you've seen quite a few during
your time, Tony, and can you also explain

966
00:56:09,375 --> 00:56:13,305
to the audience just exactly what the
ritual of the Torah, what the people

967
00:56:13,305 --> 00:56:15,825
do in relation to their loved ones?

968
00:56:16,095 --> 00:56:18,465
Some people may be
unfamiliar with what that is.

969
00:56:18,465 --> 00:56:23,775
Yeah, I think it's not very different
humanly, everyone there in the sense

970
00:56:23,775 --> 00:56:27,195
of respect and, but what is present
at the moment is a different thing.

971
00:56:27,765 --> 00:56:32,924
You know, the Biso were persecuted because
it came with a confederal society, that

972
00:56:33,045 --> 00:56:37,095
they were very highly regarded by the
kings, but those don't exist anymore.

973
00:56:37,424 --> 00:56:42,134
So in the kind of modern society of
rational and scientific area, they suffer.

974
00:56:42,645 --> 00:56:49,154
So how to find a legitimacy of the
Biso people is quite interesting.

975
00:56:49,154 --> 00:56:52,484
I mean, I would like to answer
that question nicely in the kind of

976
00:56:52,845 --> 00:56:59,444
research area that's, you know, what
is the future for an, you know, this

977
00:56:59,444 --> 00:57:05,174
be so young person, and what is he
contributing for People like us, you

978
00:57:05,174 --> 00:57:10,785
know, he might think that we are the
one who needs to be saved, you know?

979
00:57:10,785 --> 00:57:10,845
Yeah.

980
00:57:11,325 --> 00:57:11,654
So.

981
00:57:12,285 --> 00:57:18,105
Because there's a beauty in that kind
of understanding that two differences,

982
00:57:18,405 --> 00:57:25,695
and I think, I mean physically it
is a poorer country materially, but

983
00:57:25,695 --> 00:57:27,825
they are rich in many other ways.

984
00:57:28,305 --> 00:57:28,605
You know?

985
00:57:28,965 --> 00:57:33,495
I mean when you think about
agriculture for those stuff, right?

986
00:57:33,795 --> 00:57:38,835
When you think about, so when they
were persecuted by the Muslims,

987
00:57:38,895 --> 00:57:45,105
certain kind of more extreme Muslim
group, I think I know empty story.

988
00:57:45,285 --> 00:57:49,905
I read somewhere where there are
three groups of how BI could react.

989
00:57:49,905 --> 00:57:52,845
One is they, they're in the seventies.

990
00:57:52,845 --> 00:57:55,995
I think they were giving the ultimatum
of this repentant movement or

991
00:57:55,995 --> 00:57:59,025
something that if they don't repent,
they'll be sentenced to death.

992
00:57:59,435 --> 00:58:04,535
So they can die, which some of them
do because they're so stable in their

993
00:58:04,535 --> 00:58:06,995
belief that they go out and die.

994
00:58:07,535 --> 00:58:12,545
Or second group where they can
assimilate and embrace Islam and

995
00:58:12,755 --> 00:58:14,194
find their positions in Islam.

996
00:58:14,255 --> 00:58:19,055
And it's a big group too, so they
become imams and have high positions,

997
00:58:19,055 --> 00:58:24,154
but they embrace Muslim Islamic
culture but then still have a

998
00:58:24,154 --> 00:58:27,694
kind of practice of understanding.

999
00:58:27,694 --> 00:58:30,815
So this, I dunno how, but
I dunno where I would go.

1000
00:58:31,055 --> 00:58:32,525
But the third group is quite interesting.

1001
00:58:32,525 --> 00:58:37,025
They escape into the jungle and
basically nobody could find them.

1002
00:58:37,115 --> 00:58:38,645
What kind of magic?

1003
00:58:39,135 --> 00:58:41,820
Of Invis, how to be invisible, you know?

1004
00:58:42,210 --> 00:58:47,970
And those are more interesting, the
kind of connection of us how to be

1005
00:58:48,210 --> 00:58:56,010
inconspicuous or how to disappear and how
to come back again and reappear and where

1006
00:58:56,010 --> 00:58:58,080
are these places, you know, just this.

1007
00:58:58,140 --> 00:59:02,035
So it is a kind of mystical area of magic.

1008
00:59:03,880 --> 00:59:04,720
And maybe it's not.

1009
00:59:04,720 --> 00:59:06,160
Maybe it's something very simple.

1010
00:59:06,160 --> 00:59:09,970
But anyway, you have this kind of,
between these three groups, you can

1011
00:59:09,970 --> 00:59:12,820
see yourself in this, what would I do?

1012
00:59:13,150 --> 00:59:15,340
You know, the hero and the saint.

1013
00:59:16,000 --> 00:59:18,880
Working with all of the
different organizations that

1014
00:59:18,880 --> 00:59:22,600
you have, or communities that
you have, Tony, in your time.

1015
00:59:22,605 --> 00:59:22,855
Mm-hmm.

1016
00:59:23,050 --> 00:59:27,160
What has it taught you about, perhaps,
or what are your thoughts about the

1017
00:59:27,160 --> 00:59:29,500
afterlife and the spiritual realm?

1018
00:59:29,620 --> 00:59:29,800
Mm.

1019
00:59:30,220 --> 00:59:33,730
When I think about that
question, I think about language.

1020
00:59:34,270 --> 00:59:38,590
You know how even within a certain
culture they use different language,

1021
00:59:38,590 --> 00:59:42,490
like English too, you can see how
people answer their questions.

1022
00:59:42,640 --> 00:59:46,480
And I don't have a specific
language for that, I don't think.

1023
00:59:46,600 --> 00:59:52,720
I know that there are words like
the incarnation or life after, and

1024
00:59:52,720 --> 00:59:57,280
I do not know how to articulate
how I understand those words.

1025
00:59:57,580 --> 01:00:00,580
I think it's something to
do with a naturalness, you

1026
01:00:00,580 --> 01:00:02,200
know, like so level of being.

1027
01:00:02,535 --> 01:00:09,585
Unnatural is bringing back to be the human
nature, you know, like nature, right?

1028
01:00:09,585 --> 01:00:14,775
In his book, human All to Human, and
he is like, you know, God is dead.

1029
01:00:15,165 --> 01:00:20,865
So it's in, it's like thinking like
if you're born somewhere without

1030
01:00:20,865 --> 01:00:23,835
any of this knowledge in the
jungle somewhere, then what is it?

1031
01:00:24,315 --> 01:00:24,645
You know?

1032
01:00:24,975 --> 01:00:25,605
It's just there.

1033
01:00:26,325 --> 01:00:31,665
I don't think there is an idea that your
parent baboons will tell you that there's

1034
01:00:31,665 --> 01:00:34,245
a life after death or anything, you know?

1035
01:00:34,935 --> 01:00:37,305
When something dies, you react.

1036
01:00:37,635 --> 01:00:41,835
There's a whole emotional feeling,
so it's rich, right to feel grief.

1037
01:00:41,955 --> 01:00:46,695
It's rich to feel a sense
of love, heartbreak, loss.

1038
01:00:47,655 --> 01:00:49,965
It's so human.

1039
01:00:50,295 --> 01:00:55,935
When you go through that emotional,
I think it taught me about what I can

1040
01:00:55,935 --> 01:01:01,905
do now, maybe what is available to
me and how deficient I am from that.

1041
01:01:02,415 --> 01:01:05,565
It's kind of appreciation,
kind of celebration.

1042
01:01:05,655 --> 01:01:10,005
I suppose if anything teaches me,
it's too hard to celebrate life.

1043
01:01:10,485 --> 01:01:16,035
Maybe I don't think I understand
life after death, but I definitely

1044
01:01:16,035 --> 01:01:18,735
think that nothing disappears.

1045
01:01:19,415 --> 01:01:25,955
I think, you know, sometimes I think
because I did experience five me ODMT,

1046
01:01:26,045 --> 01:01:30,785
which is a kind of a drug you take
from the frog and then you go into

1047
01:01:30,785 --> 01:01:35,884
this, and then when DMT is released
in your body, there's no thought.

1048
01:01:35,884 --> 01:01:37,295
It's just a different dimension.

1049
01:01:37,355 --> 01:01:38,795
It is quite amazing.

1050
01:01:39,335 --> 01:01:40,595
Sometimes I feel that.

1051
01:01:40,595 --> 01:01:42,515
Just give me an insight of.

1052
01:01:42,785 --> 01:01:47,645
Or is impossible to
imagine or to even explain.

1053
01:01:47,915 --> 01:01:50,705
So maybe there's nothing
to fear about that.

1054
01:01:50,944 --> 01:01:54,830
There is so many questions I wanna
ask about what you just said there.

1055
01:01:57,290 --> 01:02:00,575
The fact that I'm just getting my head
around the fact that you've taken the

1056
01:02:00,575 --> 01:02:04,790
toxin of the like isn't that the corrobory
tree frog or the green tree frog or

1057
01:02:04,899 --> 01:02:06,754
that is combo that is different.

1058
01:02:06,754 --> 01:02:08,645
That is actually it.

1059
01:02:08,915 --> 01:02:11,915
Something to do with the bile
and it actually, like you vomit

1060
01:02:12,214 --> 01:02:13,955
the water you drink, you know?

1061
01:02:14,194 --> 01:02:14,524
Oh right.

1062
01:02:14,585 --> 01:02:15,904
That this is another one.

1063
01:02:15,964 --> 01:02:17,975
I dunno which desert it comes from.

1064
01:02:18,095 --> 01:02:22,265
So you scrap the skin and then
you inhale and it releases.

1065
01:02:22,504 --> 01:02:23,345
Oh DMT.

1066
01:02:23,345 --> 01:02:27,815
You can take like the vines, you
know how you have mixture vines?

1067
01:02:27,815 --> 01:02:28,805
The ayahuasca?

1068
01:02:29,645 --> 01:02:29,765
Yeah.

1069
01:02:29,765 --> 01:02:29,766
Yep.

1070
01:02:29,766 --> 01:02:32,855
And then you might vomit or
you might, you know, shit.

1071
01:02:32,944 --> 01:02:35,734
I took that, but I didn't have
experience vomiting and things.

1072
01:02:35,734 --> 01:02:37,774
But I actually went to kind of euphoria.

1073
01:02:38,375 --> 01:02:39,484
In fact, almost.

1074
01:02:40,245 --> 01:02:40,665
Yeah.

1075
01:02:41,205 --> 01:02:42,165
Ejaculation.

1076
01:02:42,549 --> 01:02:42,839
Yeah.

1077
01:02:42,859 --> 01:02:43,080
Wow.

1078
01:02:43,754 --> 01:02:49,035
Yeah, so it, it was quite an interesting
area 'cause somebody told me to surrender,

1079
01:02:50,100 --> 01:02:54,165
so I, what I understood surrender
is that don't fight it like yeah.

1080
01:02:54,165 --> 01:02:55,365
When this feeling comes out.

1081
01:02:55,785 --> 01:02:57,225
So it's something to do with thinking.

1082
01:02:57,765 --> 01:03:01,694
So you start thinking about it, you
feel nauseous and start vomiting, but

1083
01:03:01,785 --> 01:03:06,134
the moment you learn how to not to
think about it, then it's a kind of

1084
01:03:06,134 --> 01:03:12,615
surrendering or losing control and then
it happens, you know, it was amazing.

1085
01:03:12,734 --> 01:03:16,605
But it's quite different from the frog,
A five M-E-O-D-M-T, which is higher

1086
01:03:16,875 --> 01:03:22,845
level than DMT, which means something
in scientific, kind of a meaning DMT.

1087
01:03:23,145 --> 01:03:27,044
But yeah, definitely I have
tried a few, part of my research,

1088
01:03:28,240 --> 01:03:34,634
I was about to say, that does fall within
the remit of research on trance and,

1089
01:03:34,990 --> 01:03:36,399
yeah, and cycle.

1090
01:03:36,645 --> 01:03:37,185
Cycle.

1091
01:03:37,274 --> 01:03:37,424
What?

1092
01:03:37,875 --> 01:03:39,435
You got psychedelics.

1093
01:03:39,610 --> 01:03:39,900
Yeah.

1094
01:03:40,035 --> 01:03:40,215
Yeah.

1095
01:03:40,215 --> 01:03:44,055
And look, there is a lot of research
being done for medical trials now in

1096
01:03:44,055 --> 01:03:49,755
relation to the role that will play moving
forward in PTSD and those sorts of things

1097
01:03:49,755 --> 01:03:51,345
that we're actually seeing trials done.

1098
01:03:51,645 --> 01:03:55,754
And we know that there is, I can't
remember the exact statistics, but

1099
01:03:55,845 --> 01:03:59,234
the limited amount of potential
or parts of the brain that we are

1100
01:03:59,234 --> 01:04:01,995
currently using on our everyday basis.

1101
01:04:02,055 --> 01:04:02,145
Mm-hmm.

1102
01:04:02,145 --> 01:04:07,544
So again, it comes down to that
possibility and opportunity of becoming.

1103
01:04:07,845 --> 01:04:12,495
So in closing, Tony, because we could
definitely have a, an entire Yeah.

1104
01:04:12,584 --> 01:04:17,895
Other conversation about, about where
that's taken you, but in relation to your

1105
01:04:17,895 --> 01:04:23,205
current practice, what have you got in
relation to thoughts about when people are

1106
01:04:23,205 --> 01:04:28,995
actually going through extreme emotions
of having someone close to them die?

1107
01:04:29,049 --> 01:04:29,470
Mm-hmm.

1108
01:04:29,654 --> 01:04:35,205
What has your practice and what you've
learned along the way, how has that helped

1109
01:04:35,205 --> 01:04:41,504
you in expressing those emotions that you
feel And sometimes dark sides of grief.

1110
01:04:41,790 --> 01:04:45,944
I remember, I mean, the first
big death was my father's death.

1111
01:04:46,590 --> 01:04:48,510
I wouldn't say it's dark, you know?

1112
01:04:48,510 --> 01:04:53,010
But in some ways it was very expected
because we knew he was gonna die

1113
01:04:53,310 --> 01:04:54,420
after he goes to the hospital.

1114
01:04:54,900 --> 01:05:00,150
It's just quite a marvel to see
what he was going through, you know?

1115
01:05:00,150 --> 01:05:04,230
Like I remember one day
asking him, are you afraid?

1116
01:05:04,290 --> 01:05:08,010
And he say, oh, I have, I got
to be afraid of, you know?

1117
01:05:08,010 --> 01:05:11,640
And then after thinking about it, he
said, yeah, I am afraid, you know?

1118
01:05:11,640 --> 01:05:14,700
And then, then I think,
what do you say to him?

1119
01:05:14,700 --> 01:05:18,090
Because you asked the question and I
said, well, you know, maybe there's

1120
01:05:18,090 --> 01:05:21,810
nothing to be afraid of because this is
from the book, or living and dying the

1121
01:05:21,810 --> 01:05:26,550
Tibetan, he says that everybody before
you has taken this path, and every after

1122
01:05:26,550 --> 01:05:30,240
you, including me, will take this path
when you're just taking the path now.

1123
01:05:30,480 --> 01:05:34,440
So the most you will be is
like before you were born.

1124
01:05:34,920 --> 01:05:37,800
And we are never afraid of what
we were before we were born.

1125
01:05:38,010 --> 01:05:38,610
So that's the.

1126
01:05:39,120 --> 01:05:43,170
Best reasoning consolation you could give.

1127
01:05:43,200 --> 01:05:43,530
Right.

1128
01:05:43,770 --> 01:05:49,200
And so, yeah, I don't really quite
understand this grief people go

1129
01:05:49,200 --> 01:05:53,880
through except the imagining of,
you know, something they so used to

1130
01:05:53,880 --> 01:06:00,090
possess or depend on and how a whole
it will create, you know, or I don't

1131
01:06:00,090 --> 01:06:05,190
understand the kind of traumatic
area, that complex that comes with it.

1132
01:06:05,580 --> 01:06:08,070
Or even, yeah, in any levels.

1133
01:06:08,400 --> 01:06:14,190
But definitely they all different in the
kind of multiplicity of experiences, but

1134
01:06:14,340 --> 01:06:19,110
seeing that happen to someone does bring
out sense of compassion, doesn't it?

1135
01:06:19,470 --> 01:06:22,740
You know, sense of how can
somebody go through so much pain?

1136
01:06:22,980 --> 01:06:27,240
You will feel that compassion,
that kind of empathy and that,

1137
01:06:27,540 --> 01:06:29,520
I suppose, is a reason itself.

1138
01:06:29,760 --> 01:06:31,665
So I do not know, I. What?

1139
01:06:32,025 --> 01:06:34,515
I don't think there any one clear answer.

1140
01:06:34,695 --> 01:06:39,765
I think the multiplicity of a lot of
things happen is so complex, so there's

1141
01:06:39,765 --> 01:06:44,535
no judgment out there, or even value on
that one is a better way than the other.

1142
01:06:44,655 --> 01:06:48,165
I think I read somewhere that
saying the right way to die is when

1143
01:06:48,165 --> 01:06:51,375
you die, and the best way to die.

1144
01:06:51,950 --> 01:06:52,880
Is how you die.

1145
01:06:55,250 --> 01:06:56,120
That's very true.

1146
01:06:56,120 --> 01:07:00,410
One that's quoted quite a bit about death,
and that's on the opposite side of things

1147
01:07:00,410 --> 01:07:05,090
is I think it was Woody Allen, I think
once said he doesn't mind when he dies.

1148
01:07:05,090 --> 01:07:06,890
He just doesn't wanna be
there when it happens.

1149
01:07:09,050 --> 01:07:09,830
What's nice?

1150
01:07:09,830 --> 01:07:11,120
That's kind of dissociation.

1151
01:07:11,270 --> 01:07:11,750
He's kind of,

1152
01:07:11,870 --> 01:07:14,180
yeah, it's quite a bit of
disassociation, isn't it?

1153
01:07:14,510 --> 01:07:16,070
But that is a translate, right?

1154
01:07:16,310 --> 01:07:16,400
Yeah.

1155
01:07:16,790 --> 01:07:17,720
Just of a different kind.

1156
01:07:17,720 --> 01:07:17,780
Yeah.

1157
01:07:17,780 --> 01:07:17,990
Maybe

1158
01:07:17,990 --> 01:07:21,560
we have talked about how that the body
look after you, whether you like it or

1159
01:07:21,560 --> 01:07:23,510
not, it will put you in a trans state.

1160
01:07:24,380 --> 01:07:25,610
You don't need to work on it.

1161
01:07:25,610 --> 01:07:25,970
Yeah.

1162
01:07:26,090 --> 01:07:30,920
I have to say in talking to
you, Tony, what seems to be very

1163
01:07:30,920 --> 01:07:35,690
apparent is this multiplicity
that you keep referring back to.

1164
01:07:35,720 --> 01:07:39,200
Mm. And how there is not just one way.

1165
01:07:39,200 --> 01:07:39,440
Yeah.

1166
01:07:40,154 --> 01:07:42,884
Or one emotion or one process.

1167
01:07:43,004 --> 01:07:43,274
Yes.

1168
01:07:43,395 --> 01:07:47,475
And it's not just a static
experience, but a sense of becoming.

1169
01:07:47,475 --> 01:07:47,535
Yeah.

1170
01:07:47,774 --> 01:07:49,634
And a process that we are going through.

1171
01:07:49,694 --> 01:07:54,645
What I really love and will be one
of my strongest takeaways from today

1172
01:07:54,734 --> 01:07:59,685
was when you referred to the memory
of your mother and the fact that she

1173
01:07:59,685 --> 01:08:05,595
went from being a memory of her being
that one point in time of where she's

1174
01:08:05,595 --> 01:08:12,165
now and when she was alive, to now
remembering her at all stages of her life.

1175
01:08:12,524 --> 01:08:17,085
And I think that's a beautiful
way to think of someone in such a

1176
01:08:17,085 --> 01:08:19,545
fluid manner once they have died.

1177
01:08:19,545 --> 01:08:22,785
And I really appreciate you
sharing that perspective and

1178
01:08:22,785 --> 01:08:25,274
just how beautiful your work is.

1179
01:08:25,335 --> 01:08:26,354
Thank you very much.

1180
01:08:26,474 --> 01:08:26,715
Yeah.

1181
01:08:26,715 --> 01:08:26,774
Yeah.

1182
01:08:27,495 --> 01:08:28,694
Just you mentioned my mother.

1183
01:08:28,694 --> 01:08:30,495
I just finished this
off a little bit, but.

1184
01:08:31,004 --> 01:08:31,694
When she died.

1185
01:08:31,700 --> 01:08:33,644
It's so much different
from when my father died.

1186
01:08:34,064 --> 01:08:36,314
So that's another experience.

1187
01:08:36,434 --> 01:08:39,495
'cause her name was Ang,
which means love, you know?

1188
01:08:39,495 --> 01:08:44,115
So I, I did, I did a
performance both of their death.

1189
01:08:44,654 --> 01:08:50,295
You know, it was quite interesting because
that was a very rich moment for an artist.

1190
01:08:50,774 --> 01:08:52,484
So it's powerful time.

1191
01:08:52,934 --> 01:08:58,665
So there's a lot of gift from the process
of death from somebody dying as well,

1192
01:08:59,234 --> 01:09:04,274
so that maybe there's a consolation
that when you die, it's also a gift to

1193
01:09:04,964 --> 01:09:08,384
people, you know, disappearing or losing.

1194
01:09:08,774 --> 01:09:15,615
There's always more in the essence of
when you disappear, you become luminous.

1195
01:09:16,125 --> 01:09:17,835
It's the same thing, you know?

1196
01:09:17,835 --> 01:09:21,854
So it's not a singular binary,
meaning it's either black or white,

1197
01:09:21,884 --> 01:09:26,325
but it's together, I think, and
maybe that is the learning thing.

1198
01:09:26,325 --> 01:09:29,835
What my father and my mother
is like two different area.

1199
01:09:30,150 --> 01:09:34,529
One go quickly, and the other one,
he decided to go slowly, a kind of

1200
01:09:34,529 --> 01:09:39,000
deterioration, which give a whole
different experience for the living.

1201
01:09:39,510 --> 01:09:42,390
You know, like people in
dementia and things like that.

1202
01:09:42,870 --> 01:09:45,270
Thank you so much for
sharing that insight, Tony.

1203
01:09:45,480 --> 01:09:47,190
I really appreciate talking to you today.

1204
01:09:47,220 --> 01:09:47,670
Thank you.

1205
01:09:47,850 --> 01:09:48,690
It's a pleasure.

1206
01:09:48,690 --> 01:09:48,750
You.

1207
01:09:51,660 --> 01:09:55,110
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1208
01:09:55,410 --> 01:09:57,150
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1209
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01:10:02,190 --> 01:10:04,140
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1218
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