Yup'ik Arnaq (Yup'ik Woman)
Tuma Theatre
written & performed by Theresa John
devised directed
Though the show is a little over one hour in length, it spans several centuries in time, from before contact with the western world to the present. Asked to give a glimpse of the show, John closes her eyes and shuts out the world before beginning.
Dressed in sealskin mukluks, jeans, a T-shirt and hand –sewn squirrel skin parka, decorated with wolf, wolverine and beaded in the family tradition, she looks every bit the paradox she represents. A powerful presence emerges as John tells the story of the Yup’ik woman and her people using several languages, Yup’ik, English, hand gestures, dance and song. When she sobs for what has been lost the drumming changed to learning piano, the shamans to western religion, the culture as it was, the tears are real.
The show is dynamic because it is not acting, she said. “These are my real feeling,” she said. “They are an accumulation of what has been unspoken. Traditionally we don’t talk about our feelings.”
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
