When asked to describe her music, artist Muyassar Kurdis is unafraid to use the term “dada.” While almost a century separates her from that movement, last Saturday night’s intimate performance at the Whitehaus would not have seemed out of place at Zurich’s Cabaret Voltaire. Accompanied by Al Margolis and Walter Wright, Kurdi brought movement, electronic effects and vocals that defied the rational to Jamaica Plain. This performance marked the last stop of the Kurdi Margolis Tour that took the artist to galleries, music venues, and even a church on the East Coast.

The show began when Kurdi strapped on a certain device that responds to movement and light onto her back. She placed herself at the center of the darkened room and slipped into what seemed like a transient, primal state. As she moved around the room and emitted vocalizations that ranged from the guttural to the melodic and hum-like, one could not help but feel like a part of a secret, long forgotten ritual.

Kurdi counts the Japanese dance form Butoh as one of her influences. This Avant-Garde movement known for defying definitions is raw and direct along the same vein as her work. The artist’s dance while measured and restrained was also incredibly violent. She raised her arms towards the ceiling, reached towards the audience, or curled up on the floor slowly as if enjoying every second of the trajectory of her movement. The performance was emotionally vibrant and at times frightening, but it always remained approachable to her audience.

Kurdi’s art starts from her body. The partly improvisational sounds and movements that structure her performance are a product of form living within her. While her work at first might seem grounded in the individual, the artist aims to move towards the more universal. “I want to move beyond personal experience,” she explains. And this is exactly what she does. The story that Kurdi tells us through her performance is a distinctly transcendent human story.