The Persephone Series
A Mediterranean Seed Story
A long-term hybrid mythopoetic performance project. A creative labour of love and learning in collaboration with writer, director and cultural psychologist, Dr Craig San Roque, Alice Springs community and artists.
Miriam plays the role of Persephone, is creative producer for the body of work and co-author of Persephone’s Heart with Craig San Roque.
Part 1: Persephone’s Dog
On the surface it is a drama of a mother, her daughter’s death or disappearance and return. Its origin may be from 10,000 years ago at the time of climate change ice age impact. It deals with creation events, plant and human fertility cycles, profound loss and recovery.
2015
Alice Springs Arrente, Ilparpa Quarry
Part 2: Persephone’s Body
This version tells how and why Persephone, a ‘regenerative divinity’, acquired her human body in ancient Australia. This is a transformation drama of female creative skill, generative genius, muscle, heart and brain, with shocks of desire and enduring compassion.
2016
Alice Springs Arrente, Gillen Art Shed
Persephone’s Heart
This is a combination of Part 1 and 2, co-created and performed by Miriam Pickard and Craig San Roque. Persephone’s Heart has told her stories in Santorini, Sydney, country Victoria, Portland Oregon, Perth, Canberra College Drama Students, ANZSJA’s 2022 Congress, and the Gaia Then and Now/Climate series for the San Francisco Archive for Research into Archetypal Symbolism.
2017-2020
Part 3: Persephone’s Wake
Persephone, the divine cycles and seasons is supposed to keep returning with the spring. We live in a time of turbulence and trouble. This story tells how and why Persephone gave up her body and function in our time.
The Wake was developed and presented as a radio drama for online performances, webinars and workshops.
2021-2022
Persephone Series with ARAS
Archive for Research in Archetypal Symbolism
The Archive for Research in Archetypal Symbolism (ARAS) is a pictorial and written archive of mythological, ritualistic, and symbolic images from all over the world and from all epochs of human history. In 2021, ARAS launched a series of webinars.
ARAS Public Webinar Series
Gaia: Then and Now; The Mythopoetics of Climate Change
View the webinar; Persephone’s Heart
View the webinar; Persephone’s Wake
The presentations focus on our relationship to the Earth, as revealed through the study of ancient and contemporary symbolic imagery as it appears in myth, the visual arts, dance, and dramatic story telling.