ROOTS – connecting people, place and plants (until Sunday 18 August)

I’m late. Though I still think I’m early. The GPS has plotted a route that unexpectedly takes me up to the top of the Whiterock Road. The road narrows to a lane. The gradient forces my lightweight car into first gear and it complains as it clamber to the top, round the tight corner and then faces back down towards the city. The track has now become the Ballygomartin Road and it widens. The GPS is certain that I have arrived at my destination, an isolated field which is even bereft of mobile phone signal to try a different app. I head on, further down, and the Belfast 2024 branding hints that I have arrived at the Black Mountain Shared Space.

The audience for ROOTS, perhaps appropriately given some of the piece’s overall narrative, have been split into three groups, tribes if you like, each wearing a different colour and hearing different voices in our heads through the wireless headphones that deliver the Isaac Gibson’s soundscape and poet Maria McManus’ word pictures.

“And in the beginning was the mountain … sleeping under her duvet of ice.”

Following the opening segment that grounds the piece in its location, each tribe heads off in a different direction. For me, there was a period of meditation, thinking about the abundance of the natural world and deepening our connection with the land and the shrubs in a community garden that has been planted and will survive beyond these performances. There was a period of collaboration, planting and realising that once there are two people, there can be a cure, with laughs and mutual support. Finally, in my version of the performance, there was a period with conflict, a couple falling out of harmony, shifting from pulling together to pushing apart, one carrying the other who seemed limp and injured, stumbling through their hurts before one lifts the other to new heights.

The three tribes and the five dancers reconvene for the final sequence. It’s been a time of communal experience and expression. The performers demonstrate a sense of togetherness, leading each other, leaping up, setting down, trusting and belonging in concert.

Over the hour, the audience aren’t left as mere spectators. We have become involved in the planting, encouraged to look and feel and smell what’s growing in the beds. Moving through the space, we have walked under wooden arches, doors to new places, portals to new ways of living. To one side, children are playing in the street, throwing balls and zooming around on scooters. Our headphones may have blocked out the noise, but their presence grounds the site in its locale, connecting the communities of the Springfield Road and the Ballygomartin Road.

The bark mulch is soft to stand on. Una Hickey’s gorgeous slate/green/beige costumes tone in with the hues of the landscape and the garden. Clara Kerr, Ed Mitchell, Rosie Mullin, Harry Wilson and Sarah Flavelle bring each section of the work to life with their flowing moves, wordlessly guiding their wandering audience around each space and through the emerging story.

Artistic director and choreographer Eileen McClory (OTR/Off The Rails dance theatre company) has created a thoughtful, site-specific, outdoor performance that blends dance, poetry, storytelling, and active participation. It’s a triumph and well worth finding.

ROOTS asks what roots us to the places we live and work and encounter each other. It asks what we feed on to sustain us. It asks what we are planting as a ‘love notes’ or gifts for the future. The new Black Mountain Shared Space building will be home to sport, meetings, community projects, performances, and a garden. Like ROOTS, it hopes to connect people, place, and plants.

While this is a site-specific piece, positioned high up overlooking part of Belfast, many of the themes can be elevated to a universal level. ROOTS has been in the planning for many months. Yet it’s portrait of people living side by side but not always in harmony is not only a metaphor for the situation in this part of Belfast, but also speaks into the fractured wellbeing of the city as it responds to anti-immigration marches, expressions of racism, violent attacks, and vigorous shows of strength to counter these challenges to the city’s rich diversity and sense of welcome.

ROOTS is part of Belfast City Council’s Belfast 2024 programme. Performances continue at 3pm and 7pm until Sunday 18 August (with no shows on Monday 12 and Tuesday 13). Tickets are available from Belfast International Arts Festival. Dress appropriately as the show will go ahead no matter the weather!

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