Mapping: An original method of practice and research

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to expose mapping as an original method of practice and research, striving to reveal its inherent performativity; to demonstrate its many possible applications within a creative process; and to open a line of enquiry on the production of signs (where the term sign is used in its broader sense as anything that conveys a meaning which is not contained in the sign itself). Mapping is here considered a particular instance of drawing: employed to portray the movement of bodies in space within the specific context of my choreographic practice and performance-oriented projects. My recent performance Invisible Cities is used as a case study to analyse mapping as a performative device and draw important conclusions on the meaning of performativity. The paper aims to show how this method has evolved over time from its original scope of documenting my creative process into a source of cyclical scores. The text outlines some practice-based, preliminary findings on maps as an object and on mapping as a process, using cognitive and anthropological theories that informed the method. It shows how the theory of metaphors and the notion of vitality affects influence the formation of signs in both processes of mapping/looking at maps, and moving/looking at movement. Finally, this method is suggested as a valuable approach to a wider category of practice and research related to drawing and performance.