‘Fortunes of the Forest’ is a deck of 40 divination cards created during Caitlin’s six-month artist residency at Karawatha Forest Discovery Centre, Brisbane in 2017. Each card depicts an image of a plant, insect or mineral found in Karawatha Forest photographed by Man Cheung. The cards and interpretations highlight unique qualities of the forest ecosystems, interweaving ethnobotanical, biological, and spiritual stories to guide the reader. Since 2017, Caitlin has performed intimate one-on-one and group readings nationally and internationally and has been joined by dancer Amaara Raheem and Indigenous legal scholar Dr. Christine Black to extend the readings into movement scores, storytelling, conversation and text.
Fortunes of the Forest: Divination, Dance, and Story 2021
Fortunes of the Forest: Divination, Dance, and Story was a livestreamed, participatory performance incorporating plant knowledge through ritual, movement and conversation. The event took place on August 18, 2020 as part of the digital residency “Ensayos: Passages”. Australian Ensayos collaborators Dr. C.F. Black (Christine), Amaara Raheem, and Caitlin Franzmann came together to offer unique perspectives on plant consciousness. As an Indigenous legal scholar and intellectual explorer, Christine’s ancestry, research and travel have shaped her understanding of how to interact with plant beings and other beings on the Earth in a lawful manner. Christine spoke of a deep knowledge about the microscopic and galactic that Australian Aboriginals gained from intimately knowing a place and its shifting structures. Dance artist, Amaara Raheem, invited the audience to be seen and to move together in a guided hand movement score – a ritual to acknowledge the collective and to begin aligning with the plants in the Fortunes of the Forest deck.