Visceral, Arresting and Immersive Pōhutu is a collaborative work between Choreographer Bianca Hyslop and Performance Designer/Artist Rowan Pierce. Through a collision of bold performative and design languages, the result is theatrical alchemy that is both physically arresting and emotionally resonant.
Pōhutu draws on the life of Bianca's grandmother Ramari Rangiwhiua Haslem nee. Morrison (Ginger) and the connection to her ancestral whenua Te Whakarewarewatanga-o-te-ope-tauā-a-Wāhiao, Rotorua. Situated on a double fault line and home to Pōhutu; the Southern Hemisphere’s largest active geyser. Whakarewarewa is a place of tremendous power where the natural geothermal landscape is forever changing and re-shaping itself.

Ginger lived the last of her years with Alzheimers. Pōhutu draws parallels between her shapeshifting mind and the restless landscape of Whakarewarewa; the whenua she was born from and has now returned to.
 

E kore te tai o ngā mihi e timu mōu e Kuia, me te aroha mutunga kore. Ka haruru a Pōhutu tonu, te hononga aroha tāua ki a tāua. Kua au te moe e Kui i roto i te āio mo ake, ake tonu.
 

The result is an impressionistic work that manifests the ephemeral, fragmented nature of identity and one's connection to memory, time, place and loss. Through these specific dramaturgical touchstones Pōhutu offers an experience for all that highlights the fragility of identity and the universal experiences of loss and human connection.