Figure 4. Iliana Contos, Artistic Response, 2021, gesture with stone in hand, 65 × 80mm.

I informed my companion that I intended to bracket in movement and gesture. As an actor, I have always found the kinaesthetic experience to be revealing. I tuned into the felt sense of rubbing the stone with my thumb, which I had begun doing instinctively; the cool, firm surface was beginning to warm, and the heat and weight felt soothing. Tufnell and Crickmay (2004) describe this as improvising: “we feel our way into conversation with our materials and listen out for an emergent form to appear… the impulse towards what we choose may be very slight, perhaps something our body senses and does before we realise it” (p.69). Noticing the way that I engaged with the stone began the flow of conversation between myself and the materials. See Figure 5 for an amplification of Figure 4.

Figure 5. Iliana Contos, Amplification of Artistic Response, 2021, movement.

I realised I was using my dominant side; I was curious as to what would happen if I moved the stone into my left hand. I spent time recreating the movement in the non-dominant fingers, and I described to my companion that there was “less dexterity and control.” The words “less… control” hit me right in the centre of the chest; the sensation of pressure began to build. Without thought, my right hand started rubbing and soothing the surface of my chest, as if to alleviate the tension. I associated this felt sense in the chest as, “I’m losing control.” This can be understood as interoception – the ability to perceive within (Siegel & Sieff, 2015) – a sixth sense that becomes sharpened with theatrical training. My companion referred to the prompts and encouraged me to consider what behaviour might be present. I looked up to the top left corner of my field of vision searching for the answer. “What is the behaviour? I know the behaviour… don’t I? Why can’t I name it?” The sensation in my chest diffused. I became confused as I mulled over its significance and the correct words, sifting for the right answer. Confusion felt like tension in the head, although the rest of my body was numb, and my eyes were darting around the room as if I were to find the answer written on the wall. Fredman (2004) considers the body as a communicator of feelings that gives us clues so that we can notice and make sense. This physiological and emotional change was a sign my body was withdrawing. I now understand this as a choice-moment.

When all the sense awareness drained from me and a mental perplexity emerged, I realised I was moving further away from an embodied knowing. I examined what was happening; I was looking up, somewhere outside of myself for an answer. Through engaging in the process of reflexivity, the method of reflecting in experience (Reis, 2011), I was able to recognise this and distinguish alternative paths forward. Tufnell and Crickmay (2004) consider that the more we discriminate, the more choices we have available to us. I could continue doing what I was doing: verbally constructing and intellectualising an assumption. Or alternatively, I could trust that resonant insight would emerge clearly if I used materials or modes to make the implicit visible (Lett, 2011). I chose to follow the latter. With my companion’s guidance, I amplified this key moment by using movement to illustrate the sensation of pressure in the chest. Unexpectedly, I found that the representation for ‘losing control’ was no movement at all, but rather to stop breathing and freeze. As I described this to my partner, we became conscious that I non-consciously made a gesture of fists in front of my chest, indicative of the initial representation: the nucleus of the map. I translated this as clenching and holding on. The words emerged, “When I am losing control, I feel pressure to hold on tight.”

The wisdom demonstrated by my gestures and movements uncovered an awareness my body knew implicitly but that remained cognitively elusive. Ogden (2009) asserts that:

Most human behaviour is driven by procedural memory… the “how” rather than the “what” or “why”… early attachment experiences and unresolved trauma both leave their imprint on the body’s procedural memory system, shaping the posture, gestures, and movements of the body. (p.5)

Wallin (2007) describes it as “enactment” and goes on to say that evocation and embodiment are the way people communicate what they know but have not thought – and therefore cannot talk about (p.122). By following felt sense, by allowing gesture and movement to describe, and by opening to the imaginal expression of movement, the thematic statement started to write itself. The words arrived readily. See Figure 6 for my thematic statement: a reduction of the map.

Figure 6. Iliana Contos, Thematic Statement, 2021, pen on paper, 40 × 200mm.

The insights felt significant and compelling because the body was guiding, and the mind was clear; the physical sensations were sharp and there was no confused mental narrative. I was listening intently, and I could hear a unified mind–body response. The modes of gesture and movement unveiled deeper insight; I understood what happens when I feel like things are out of my control on a deep, visceral level. I discerned a congruent behavioural response to the loss of stability and livelihood in lockdown. Moreover, I could, and still can, recognise an ingrained pattern of being that was present throughout much of my life: the tendency to hold in feelings and the pressure to be an unwavering wall of strength in response to grief. The way in which I engaged with the modes began to reveal profound aspects of my relationship with self, with others, and the world at large.