In parallel to the three-day symposium ‘Tidal Gatherings’, taking place at If I Can’t Dance & CBK Zuidoost on 4, 5, 6 October, Ja Ja Ja Nee Nee Nee presents ‘A Letter to the Lemniscate: Radio Frequencies From The Third Ear’, a radio piece by interdisciplinary artist, scholar, and priestess Desiree Mwalimu-Banks, who participates in the symposium with a new lecture performance on water-keeping, the sacred feminine, indigenous identity, apiary culture, and the poetics of eros and eroticism.

Originally aired on Wave Farm Radio WGXC 90.7 FM, and offered as an extension of her contribution, Mwalimu-Banks describes the transmission as such:

“‘A Letter to the Lemniscate: Radio Frequencies From The Third Ear’ is a gathering of audio memoirs exploring global anthologies of the divine feminine, and the ways this has shaped my personal mythography, all attuned to the frequency of the lemniscate, which in Bee Shamanism, is the number ‘8’. Related, and perhaps not so coincidental, ‘8’ happens to be my life path number in numerology, and ‘8’ also describes the numerological alignment that informs the energetics taking place in this year, 2024. There are eight movements in total with four additional pieces emerging from two of those eight including:

• The Void
• Origins
• Bees
• Mushrooms
• Caves
• Sacred Feminine: Global Feminisms/Isis Pelagia
• Labyrinth
• Stars: Transitioning to Stars/Stars

The work is an invitation to travel with me, as I trace the contours of this transformative journey, into a poetics of sound via the practice of radio art transmissions."

Please have a look at her Broadcast Notes for further information about the sources and references in this audio piece.

About Tidal Gatherings

‘Tidal Gatherings’ is a three-day symposium on the intersections between water, ecology, and Dutch colonialism taking place at If I Can’t Dance and CBK Zuidoost on October 4, 5, 6 2024. It is curated by Chandra Frank in the framework of ‘Sound System Ecologies’, a collaborative project with DJ Lynnée Denise, and funded by the Mondriaan Fund Open Call Slavery Memorial Year Grant (2023–2024). It takes place in the context of If I Can’t Dance multi-year collaboration with CBK Zuidoost and is organized in tandem with Sharelly Emanuelson’s exhibition ‘Between a Dance and Sitting in a Chair’, a project by CBK Zuidoost taking place in SHEBANG from 3 October - 24 November 2024.

More information and programme here.