Labyrintista Ariane Burgess co-creates with nature to make places where humans can consciously deepen their awareness of the interdependence of all forms of life on Earth. Labyrinths are her chosen medium and she makes them in city parks, abandoned fruit orchards, beaches and among other places. Her fascination in transforming the present day myths we live by brought her to the labyrinths, and through them she is actively embodying a new mythology for future generations.

labyrinth preparations

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SJ: as a resident of the lower east side for almost 20 years, you have been involved in so many things from being a community garden activist, a filmaker, and now a labyrintista... what currently is grabbing your attention?

A: permaculture and preparing for sun dance. on august 1st, i will fly to sioux falls and hopefully get picked up for a four hour drive to the dance grounds. i’ve made a four year commitment and this is year three. although the first year was easy, sun dance is a deep and intense - oh my god - how to prepare more conciously to enter this circle?

SJ: so what are you doing to prepare?

A: i am making 405 prayer ties which are little squares of colored cloth - red, black, white and yellow representing the four directions. i sew 101 of each color smudge each one with sage, say a prayer and put in a tiny pinch of tobacco. tobacco communicates with to Great Spirit. i have never had any formal training in this, but i do know what each of the directions and colors represent and the tobacco guides me.

SJ: so why the amount of 405? or rather 404 +1?

A: i can't say... yet, that teaching has not come to me, perhaps that is something i will know after this dance.

SJ: what are some examples of your prayers?

A: “i handle the levels of abundance that helps many.”

“thank you for the clean, pure, freeflowing water in all its forms.”

“thank you for the wisdom of the natural world and its knowledge of compost.”

“for future generations, that we speak our truth.”

SJ: how big are these prayer ties?

A: mine are small about 1” x 1/4”. some people make huge ones but my approach is resource conservation.

SJ: what do you do with them? do you bring them to the sun dance?

A: i arrive on the second day of the four days of purification. on the fourth day, everyone goes to the forest and gets the tree. it is a cottonwood tree that was chosen the year before and has been prayed over all year. the day before, last year’s cottonwood with prayer ties was burned. so the new sacred tree is cut down and hoisted up onto poles and planted in the same deep pit where last year’s tree stood. all of this is done with a lot of energy and attention to the sacred. about 300 people lakota and others put their prayers on its branches.

SJ: why is a cottonwood chosen? how tall is this tree?

A: oooh gosh, about the size of a ship’s mast. and as far as why it’s chosen, it may be due to it being the common deciduous tree that grows there. i don't know if it's a cottonwood at all sundance or what is local to where the dance takes place - if is was a permaculture sundance then it would be the later.

A: the next four days is the sun dance. it all begins shockingly early in the morning - sometimes we are actually breaking ice that forms in out water buckets! and it’s august! before sunrise there are several rounds of sweating in the sweat lodge. we wear sage on our heads, wrists and ankles and then we dance for four days straight.

SJ: for four days?! without sleeping?!

A: i can’t tell you what happens. there is a tremendous amount of tricksterism. it takes everything to retain clarity and focus. i concentrate on the tree and my prayers.

SJ: what other ways are you preparing yourself for sun dance?

A: I am been participating in sweat lodges - hot ones to give my body a sense of what it will meet on the dance grounds. i am floating on my back in the ocean feeling my body dissolve in the water so that i can invoke the sense of being water while dancing. i am riding my bicycle imaging that each turn of the pedal is a step on the dance ground. i am visioning how i would like the rest time in the arbor to be a fresh air experience. i am meditating daily. gardening on hot days, letting the sun soak my body. minimizing time in air conditioned atmospheres - although today i put mine on for Chi who is just a melted puddle of fur at the moment. connecting with people who were with me last year - just spoke with a friend from australia.

SJ: you mentioned that the other thing that is currently grabbing your attention is 'permaculture'. can you talk a bit more about how you are practicing permaculture on the lower eastside?

A: a few years ago i was introduced to the basic principle of permaculture - i had in my mind that there was a list of about ten however til this day i have never found that list in my notes!

anyway - much of it appears to me to be common sense and in numerous ways i practice it, i just didn't have a catch all term for what i was doing. permaculture seems to be a way of living that brings harmony and balance through acknowledging the interdependent relationships of all of nature (in which humans are included - we are nature). Its a way of living abundantly and efficiently meeting fundamental needs while minimizing impact on resources.

so the second part of the question is how am i doing that?

SJ: yup!

A: my energy foot print is somewhat small - living in an efficient living space and finding ways to do my creative work outdoors in natural settings. growing my own food and sourcing locally, beginning to forage and sharing that with others. riding my bicycle for most local travel and mass transit. car-pooling for travelling out of city. seeking ways to have all my material needs met as locally as possible and considering ways to make more even more local. i am part of a group called "The Canning Collective" we get together and make foods in bulk and fill up our recycled glass jars with all the deliciousness - we're all growing food in our community gardens so looking forward to making tomato sauce and canning things.

I look for networks through which information can be disseminated swiftly, the community garden network is really good for this. i am learning from living indigenous ceremonial practice how to create my personal way of honoring all that sustains life and am deepening my awareness of how, before mechanization, it took time to make a piece of fabric or furniture, or a home, and so often it was made by a person one knew and it was filled with whatever was going on in that person as they made it. now it is too easy to have something and so it is taken for granted and discarded as easily as it came. making something and especially something that enhances life or is useful - be it a rattle for a baby or a ceremony, weaving a blanket to warm someone or growing kale and lettuce to share a lunch with a loved one these are the things that imbue life with richness and meaning.

the mulberry trees in our garden just finished fruiting, i breakfasted on them regularly, it was fun and i felt to be so connected with the energy of the earth to be enjoying the fruit of this tree. people in our garden wanted to cut down our mulberry trees, that was before they were introduced to the delights of the fruit. we are going to learn to coppice so we can keep the berries close at hand.

SJ: what else permacultural? ...

A: we have chickens in our garden, over the weekend we built a coop for them, the next step will be to make a chicken tractor so we can have their help to prepare land for growing  - bringing this about will require shifting the minds of some folks who are still in English garden mode somewhat.

i have a tiny refrigerator, i don't use ice in my drinks. i see a future where i am living with a group of people and we are sharing resources - so we don't have one fridge, one stove, one toilet per person - along with my waste output i like to consider the amount of energy, materials use and earth destruction it takes to make an appliance, piece of furniture or clothing. i find myself increasingly wanting to be surrounded by things that connect me to other people - so i have clothing that used to be worn by friends, two kitchen knives that friends gave - many things in my life have a connection to a loved one and when i use it i get to think about them and appreciate knowing them.

i am pretty minimal on having things, and would like to have even less, however at the moment doing what i am doing in the world requires various materials and storage spaces. i make my art out on the land and publicly available in the form of the labyrinth so there is minimum storage space necessary for it.

SJ: i want to end with something you once told me, that it is your “nature to track things?”

A: hmm what do i mean by that? self - awareness. by being aware of where i begin and end, what motivates me, what is food for my growth, who comes into my life to support my ability to be even more loving, some easier than others...

tracking is also an actual practice - it can be applied to all aspects of ones life - from growing food and keeping track of what is planted  - time, place, mood and what the resulting harvest is - to what the cycles of thoughts are. i am learning that thoughts are things - so what we think - if we put enough feeling into it will show up sooner or later as made material. sometimes it's been awhile since we thought so intently about it that the materialised form is not recognized, sometimes we are so attached to the catalyzing image in our imagination that we don't recognize what we thought about when it shows up. so this is where the delicate balancing act of practicing non-attachment comes in to play.

SJ: thanks ariane. wow, you be kickin’!

see ariane’s labyrinth work or contact her through: caminodepaz.org