Performance Alumnus Rodney Diverlus on Black arts in Canada today

Black Lives Matter Canada co-founder, transdisciplinary artist and school of performance alum Rodney Diverlus is at the forefront of a movement that supports and celebrates Black artists. As a movement artist, Diverlus uses performance and dance to speak truth to power, blurring the lines between protest and performance. For Diverlus, the challenges faced by BIPOC artists today also offer opportunities for finding their voices and genuine growth. It also offers opportunities for participating in and expanding networks of support, and to be creatively visionary.

As an artistic professional, Rodney Diverlus has created and interpreted works with and for Canada’s leading arts institutions including Canadian Opera Company, Art Gallery of Ontario, and Decidedly Jazz Danceworks. By using the body - a socio-political site of power - as an artistic medium for expression, Diverlus creates meaning and asserts the depth of his identity. Most recently, Diverlus’ work was featured in an art series by the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation in honour of Martin Luther King Day. The performance piece is a dance and meditation blend choreographed to a video recording of Dr. King’s last speech, and featured in  LA Magazine (external link) .

Diverlus is also the national best-selling author and co-editor of “Until We Are Free: Reflections on Black Lives Matter in Canada (external link) ,” which was released last year and explores the emergence, impact and critical relevance of the Black Lives Matter Toronto (BLMTO) movement.

1. As the co-founder of Black Lives Matter Canada and an established artist and activist, what are some of the common challenges facing Black performers and artists right now?

The trickle down effects of this economic crisis caused by the pandemic is being most felt by performers and freelancers. We can’t even begin to fathom the impacts of the sustained closure of our entire sector. When faced with the difficult decision of slimming down or shutting down, most arts institutions prioritize their admin and technical staff; with artists existing in this state of limbo. Most of us are working in other contexts, utilizing and economizing our other skill sets. Consulting, speaking and writing have been my bread and butter over the past year; skills that I am grateful for.  Some performers are forced to retire, some have watched their instruments (be it their bodies, or voice, or physicality) deteriorate as a result of little engagement. What was already one of the most competitive sectors, is now shrinking more than ever; leaving many with little opportunity. I believe there are darker days ahead for the live performance sector; but also incredible opportunities for transformation and adaptation. 

Another big challenge that predated the pandemic, but is perhaps more exaggerated now [is the plight of] Black artists of all modalities in Canada [who] are producing an incredible amount of content, bodies of work, and cultural contributions, but to far too little local attention. Many only get noticed in Canada after they leave, or export their art to the United States or Europe. A recent example is Kelly-Fyffe Marshall (external link) , whose Black-and-woman-led film premiered at Sundance (external link)  this year. It was not until American producer Ava DuVernay gave Marshall attention that she was able to get some traction here in Canada. The Americanization of our art has always been there; and very much tied to its intrinsic commercial value, but more than ever, we’re being asked to export our art for recognition, acknowledgement, and adequate compensation.What are we left with if all our best artists have to leave to find space to grow?

2. In your recent essay for CBC (external link)  you said the language used by creators and artists is often censored, distorting the lived realities of anti-black racism. How did you experience and stand up to racial oppression as an artist?

I have worked my whole career within arts institutions of various sizes; from legacy organizations to small community-focused organisations. And much of my early career was spent shrinking my Blackness. Be it my tone, my volume, my energy, my perspective, my socio-political interests. The very first year of my professional career working with an established company; my only features or solos had me portraying: a snake, a panther, a flamboyant queer caricature; always shirtless and hyper sexualized.  This choreographer could not see me as anything more than a body, an animal, or a trope.  My experience is not singular; but a common experience by Black performers, who are very much desired for diversity metrics, but rarely for our full humanity. 

I came to realize that my work within arts institutions did not  fully define my art practice, nor me as an artist. That I was free to expand my own perception of my own practice to be limitless. That freedom allows me to meander in and out of institutions while fervently committed to investigating my own curiosities and passions. I call myself a transdisciplinary artist, because my practice is very much defined by bridging together different modalities, crossing disciplines, returning back, learning new ways of expressing myself. Blurring the lines between these rigid colonial forms. The totality practice is devoted to reclaiming my own voice and creating space for other Black artists to unbridle their own artistic expressions. 

3. What do you hope to accomplish in supporting artists and creators through your work with Toronto Dance Theatre and Wildseed Black Arts Fellowship, and in general as an artist?

My work aims to be generative; fertile ground for artists and activists to build upon. I’ve had many doors open for me, and I see it as my duty to find a (proverbial) wedge to put under those doors to keep them open for others to come through.  

4. How do you see creativity as empowerment and what does the future of creativity look like to you? What role can our students play?

The future is creative. The calamities of our time seem to be occurring at greater frequencies. There are existential crises facing us all: climate change, racial reckoning, class warfare & income disparity, a wild-wild-west style speed chase to digitization, and on and on.  We will need creative solutions more than ever to move forward while making sure we don’t leave each other behind. We share a collective future, and it's up to us, artists, creatives, visionaries to model the world as we want it, to propose solutions, frameworks, ideas, to challenge us all to think deeper, feel harder; and to dream bigger. 

5. What advice would you like to share with aspiring Black performers and creatives?

Do you.  

No one else but you.

Question you, dissect you, challenge you.

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