What shapes our understanding of the norm and what role do the prevailing power and control mechanisms in society play in it? How do the ideas and values that get passed from generation to generation affect our ability to approach those who do not meet the criteria of the norm? Who needs our empathy and when?

"The performance centres h e r body, the complexity of its perception and of the introspection of consciousness. H e r body and voice apparatus as a drive to transform, living through various images and masks, visions of muted landscapes.”

The lecture performance "Five Songs – Dwelling on Earth" is a personal commemorative story and a tribute to the post-Soviet female body, encouraging to question the preconceptions of the meaning of normality, empathy and belonging in a broader societal context. Laima Jaunzema follows the body transformations of women of different generations in order to reflect on the complex relationships in which we are formed and transformed together with the world around us.

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Laima Jaunzema is a choreographer and dancer. Graduated from the SNDO (School for New Dance Development) contemporary dance choreography program at The Academy of Theatre and Dance, Amsterdam University of the Arts, and founded the inclusive education platform "Curving the Dance". Her artistic interest in the body as a medium has been shaped by the desire to explore the rifts in perception and communication in moments of public intimacy. Increased receptivity to the impulses of the surrounding environment is Laima's driving force to create places where a strong sensitivity challenges the usual perception of the body. With an incessant interest she interrogates the fractured landscape of human identity, filled with sounds, strange beliefs, violence and hope, violent hope, wonders and spectres.