'Networking the Flight of the Monarchs' is an audiovisual telematic performance. Soundscapes from monarch butterfly reserves in Canada, Mexico and the USA are live-streamed from open microphones installed by Rob Mackay in 2018 and 2019, and blended with improvised performances networked in real-time from California (David Blink - handpan/ trumpet); Mexico (Rolando Rodriguez - poetry); Canada (Jessica Rodriguez - video); and the United Kingdom (Rob Mackay - flutes and computer). Inspired by Teresa Connors’ creative practice, “ecological performativity” enacts a nonanthropocentric model, characterised as the dance of agency between living and non-living systems, human and non-human actors, and the complexity within which they are entangled. This model stems from the premise that artistic practice enables different perspectives of the world and becomes an apparatus for change, promoting what Welsby considers “a long overdue ontological shift in the way we exist in the world”. In this performance, multiple spatialities and temporalities are layered together, creating connections between past, present, and future, as well as multiple webs between human and non-human participants, weaving together in a dance of agency. The intended effect is a kind of ‘telephenomenology’, building a sense of connectedness, embodied knowing, and empathy.

Performance paper