Embodying a Site

Abstract

The article re-engages with the 9th century CE temple complex of Prambanan, in Central Java, as a performance locus, discussing the different phases of a bodily interaction with the site from the reconstitution of its dance units, retrievable from the dance reliefs of the main temple, to an exploration of the temple-dance-site connection. The author proposes that archaeology can be conceived and experienced as an embodied and performative practice: the Prambanan site has been incorporated in the archaeological process of dance movement reconstitution and its re-embodiment. This in turn has enabled a choreography of the site through an exploration of the architecture/dance relationship, mutually inscribed as a corporeality.Il va falloir de la méme manière réveiller l'expérience du monde tel qu'il nous apparait en tant nous sommes au monde par notre corps, en tant que nous percevons le monde avec notre corps.Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phénoménologie de la Perception