Sea Change Within Us
A Dance through our water concerns and climate change consequences.
Sea Change Within Us, a recreated 2019 project by Karin Stevens Dance, is a sixty-minute performance that addresses local Washington State water issues and the consequences of climate change, using the voices of real people we interviewed, combined with moving rigid structures of water images by dancing human bodies.
Eight dancers move four large panels into dynamic configurations to explore themes such as rivers and dams, endangered wild salmon and Southern Resident Orca, melting ice, sea-level rise, flooding, migration, injustices to Indigenous fishing rights, divisive politics, and the complexities of human dis/re/connection. Amid these turbulent thematic layers, grief is embodied in the “Rivers, Dams, Salmon, Orca” section through the actual cries of mother orca Tahlequah. A call to collective awareness emerges in the section “Descending Pressure,” echoing the repeated phrase of a climate activist-artist: “Our bodies are a source of wisdom.”
The performance encourages a deepening of our relationship with ecosystems, offering moments of contemplation and beauty throughout—even as it confronts difficult content—to support the felt urgency of our ecological and social crises.
As a message to disrupt a myopic, singular view point, the audience is invited to view the work from all sides and participate in a simple, guided movement practice to re/connect to a whole-bodied relationship with water and the ensuing performance.
The 2019 project was conceived, directed and choreographed by Karin Stevens*, with original sound compositions by Kaley Lane Eaton and Jessi Harvey, and large-scale installation by Roger Feldman.
For the 2025 project, we commissioned former Seattle Civic Poet 2019-2022 Jourdan Imani Keith to write an original poem for part of the recreated 2025 sound score.
The sound score includes electronic, acoustic and interview recordings: an original score with string quartet by Harvey**; electronics and sounds from Eaton’s great-great-great-grandparent’s piano that traveled by raft up the Missouri River woven with voices from 2019 interviews conducted through our collaboration with journalist Devi Lockwood’s 1,001 Stories on Water and Climate Change; with new 2025 interviews conducted by Karin Stevens; and with the newly commissioned poem by Keith. Recreated sections of the 2025 music were directed by Eaton along with assistance from composer and audio engineer, Sam Strawbridge.
Visit HERE to read and listen to the poem by Jourdan Imani Keith.
Visit HERE to listen to new 2025 interviews from all over Washington State.
Visit HERE to learn about our 2018-19 collaboration with journalist Devi Lockwood, the original interviewees, and the interactive map of 1,001 Stories on Water and Climate Change to hear interviews from the 2018/19 Seattle voices.
*Collaborative choreographic contributions from the dancers: Ice—ensemble; “Migration” in Dividing Wall—Ellie van Bever; “Ignorance & Greed & Consumption Solos” in Dividing Wall—Ben Swenson Klatt; Finale—ensemble
**Alina To - Violin, Rafael Howell - Violin, Heather Bentley - Viola, Rose Bellini - Cello
String Quartet Recorded and edited by Greg Dixon
“I am really happy that I get to interact with people who are not writing for other scholars, but with people who are using different ways of communicating rather than peer reviewed journal articles; who are willing to listen; who are willing to use that information to convey it to people in a way that is not going to put those ideological blinders on and stop the conversation. Thank you for using art. Thank you for narratives for getting the message out. The more ways we use to get the message out the more likely we’ll have an impact…thank you for giving me the opportunity.” -Nives Dolsak, Professor at UW, specializing in Sustainability Science, Climate Change, and Environmental Law; 2019 Interviewee with our 1,001 Stories/Collaboration with journalist Devi Lockwood
It is vital that dance is a resource for re/imagining and re/creating life-affirming relationships with water in us and around us; even when we must move through the concerns and human-caused consequences related to our water bodies of rain, cloud, river, urban creek, ocean, ice, glacier, endangered marine life. Can a work of dance re-narrate the story of the human-as-separate and begin new rhythms back toward interconnected structures of well-being and becoming?
The recreation of this 2019 project is funded by ArtsWA, National Endowment for the Arts, Seattle Office of Arts & Culture/Hope Corps, Earth Creative, and 4Culture.
