Listening to the River

Piece Description:

Text: Sophia Kidd

In this performative artwork, the artist invites a community of participants to join her in visiting the banks of the Bitter Bamboo River to listen to the river. This is an activity that Betsy has engaged in with communities around the world, always leading people to water not to drink liquid with their lips, but rather sound with their ears. However, it is not so much our ears that will hear the water, but rather our hearts. When Betsy has asked participants in the past to relate what it is they heard, she has more than once heard something like, “The river says it’s doing fine. The river told me to heal myself, to relieve and heal myself of what makes me suffer. That’s what the river wants me to do.” Indeed, Betsy believes that before we can heal the earth, we must first heal ourselves.