Barefoot, and wearing her traditional Paiwan wedding dress inherited from her ancestors, Ljuzem Madiljin moves through the old center of the city. The walk begins by the main entrance at Oslo’s City Hall, continues through the streets and public spaces, and concludes in another part of the city. A journey shaped by memory, presence, and transformation. Along the way, she pauses at places that hold memories of resistance and liberation, of control and community, allowing these traces in the urban landscape to reflect her own story. Through Zemiyan, a ritual Paiwan dance with ancient songs, she opens a space for listening, sensing, and sharing, where the personal and the collective, the urban and the spiritual, meet.

Ljuzem’s Walk is a performative, mobile work created and performed by Ljuzem Madiljin, dance artist and artistic director of Tjimur Dance Theatre from Taiwan. The performance has evolved over more than a decade as a personal and healing journey. It is a continuous exploration of identity and belonging as a female artist from the Paiwan people, one of Taiwan’s Indigenous groups, navigating the many roles and expectations of contemporary life.

Moving through the city, she touches on echoes of Indigenous struggle and resilience, on memories of social control and discipline, and on stories of solidarity, women’s liberation, and collective strength. She invites the audience to listen to voices still resonating in the city’s walls. Voices that feel both familiar and unfamiliar, and to share a space between past, present, and what is yet to come.

The performance opens up a shared, non-verbal communication between performer and audience – a sensory dialogue that reaches beyond language and cultural boundaries. Through the open and responsive form of dance, Ljuzem invites us to re-experience both the city and ourselves. In slow, attentive movement, where the memory of the body and the memory of place intertwine.

"Each step represents a process of self-reconstruction and self-healing. At every turn, we are presented with the opportunity to reflect on the past, embrace the present, and anticipate the future."
⎯ Ljuzem Madiljin