Mónica Casanova Interview

Mónica Casanova, is a movement artist, and ERYT AyuHatha + Akanda Prenatal Yoga Teacher, Clinical Ayurvedic Practitioner, Postpartum AyurDoula, and Panchakarma Technician. She has been a dedicated student and practitioner of Ayurvedic Medicine since 2015. She is also a classically trained dancer, performing flow artist and insured fire dancer. "I love infusing principles from different movement disciplines I am trained in to create an expressive experience as an offering for all. I find movement to be a very potent medicine that serves as a portal to awaken the innate divinity that resides within the heart." ~ Mónica

Visit her work: COCO SHAKTI AYURVEDA

OUR INTERVIEW

Note to Viewers: I want to acknowledge within the exploration of ecofeminism in this series, that Black women may not have the luxury of exploring feminism in the same way that white women, such as myself do. The intersectional impact of racism coupled with sexism and gender issues is vastly complex.

"The future of our earth may depend upon the ability of all women to identify and develop new definitions of power and new patterns of relating across difference. The old definitions have not served us, nor the earth that supports us. The old patterns, no matter how cleverly rearranged to imitate progress, still condemn us to cosmetically altered repetitions of the same old exchanges, the same old guilt, hatred, recrimination, lamentation, and suspicion. For we have, built into all of us, old blueprints of expectation and response, old structures of oppression, and these must be altered at the same time as we alter the living conditions which are a result of those structures. For the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house." - Sister Outsider - Audre Lorde :

Stories Of Rematriation Art

Water Devotion

24x39" (Charcoal & Pencil on Paper)

This piece was inspired by Mónica's fluid and embodied way of being within her movement art practice and in nature. Our bodies are our connection to the natural and organic world. Our physical forms forever tie us to the natural cycles of Earth and of life. This piece is in reverence for the fluid human form and sacred water of the Yuba River.

"Because of Nature, I understand that I am a woman, because things move, and wax, and wane, I understand that I am a woman. What does that mean to be a woman, to be the true encapsulation of manifested energy? We are the portals between worlds unknown, all life has to come through a womb." ~ Mónica

Surrender to Your Nature

19x24" (Watercolor on Paper)

"The feminine channel is the water element. I grew up around water most of my life, in Puerto Rico. My connection to water feels like the ability to tap into this endless portal of love that is accessible here on this planet, and how much water is responsible for our bodies. How much water exists within us, how our brain and skin function better with water. Water represents that movement and flexibility. Growing up partially on an Island but also in Chicago by lake Michigan, being by bodies of water has been a huge part of my life and I think that water has a lot to teach us, there is something about the way water is able to hold everything and still let it go. Water is life and it is quite worth fighting over." ~ Mónica

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