Month: October 2017

The first exercise this week ‘hands on back’ proposed some weird sensations… once my partner had took her had off of my back I felt as though I was going to fall over, but I didn’t think that I was giving that much of my weight onto her hand. I could feel the warmth of Jess’s hand after she had removed it from my back which was quite soothing to feel like she was still there supporting me. Being the leader was the more difficult role, there was a lot of responsibility to ensure your partner didn’t crash into anyone else. Jess didn’t respond to the pressure of my hand on the right hand side but she did on the left, this meant I have to put a lot of pressure on the right.

This week I couldn’t grasp surfing and rolling, this was because I wasn’t releasing weight onto my partner. A lot of this was down to her rolling onto my hair multiple times and eventually I was scared to fully relax my body in case it happened again, I know that in the future I need to ensure that I tie my hair up properly so that this doesn’t occur again. Another reason was because I go to the gym, this comment didn’t make me feel too good about myself. I go to the gym to better my body and make me stronger for dance, so when I was told it isn’t working in my favour, it resulted in me having a negative attitude for the rest of the class.

 

I felt like the first of the two contact jams this week was my favourite, having a bit of feedback allowed me to know what I needed to work on to better myself. I felt much more relaxed in the jam and I tried to work on the reading we were given about being still in table top and we played with the idea of continuous movement. We found that when we became still in this position we lost all the momentum we had previously built up. The second jam wasn’t as successful, me and Hannah felt that we needed to enter the circle and we didn’t build a connection before we started, resulting in no trust, no momentum and lack of communication.

The reading I connected the most with was ‘Contact Improvisation: A Question’ by Daniel Lepkoff. A lot of the things I was reading I noticed through my own experiences in Improvisation. It explores the never before things that emerge from Contact Improvisation;

• Relationships
• Physical sensations
• Movement pathways
• Connections

I know that every time I have practiced Contact Improvisation I have found stronger connections with certain people and created new relationships with peers I haven’t worked with before. The reading also links into the ‘Thinking in Movement’ reading where it describes Improvisation as this evenings dance, meaning that no session of Contact Improvisation is ever the same, you are constantly creating new physical sensations and movement pathways and that an improvised performance only exists in the here and now.

 

Bibliography

The research lab was interesting more than anything. Hearing peoples divided opinions about our exercises caused me to believe that thought and feeling are different for each individual in Contact Improvisation, even if the principles are the same.

The question we proposed to the group was;
How are the senses heightened or forgotten when moving through contact improvisation, with vision or without?

Senses and sight in particular are one of the most important principles in Contact Improvisation to produce a form of communication between two people. Influenced by our ‘Sensing Weight in Movement’ (Ravin, Susanne, 2010) reading where it talks about the senses being a function of how we move and out inner sensations are to be understood, meaning that our body moves as one and we are constantly receiving information from all of our senses, we just don’t always pay attention to all of them. Finally our senses tell us how we feel about situations we have been presented with. We wanted to see what would happen if we took these senses away from our peers and collect their opinions on how they felt. We came up with two exercises which were ‘lead and follow’, one with the eyes opened and the other closed, our other exercise was ‘complete the image’ with eyes open slowly closing the eyes when both partners felt comfortable to improvise however they chose.

When we asked questions at the end of our session we had a mixed set of opinions.

Question 1

• Which connection was stronger, with your eyes open or closed? Why?
  Overall people said that creating a connection in the second task was harder because you couldn’t see each other and they don’t think you can get a connection without eye contact.

Question 2

• Did you feel different with eyes closed compared to open?
  Dancing when both partners have their eyes closed is frightening because you don’t want to injure your partner, but in the 1st exercise it was easier because there was less judgement on what movements they created.

Question 3

• Did you create new movements?
  New movements were created in the 1st exercise compared to the 2nd, they think this again was down to feeling less comfortable when both eyes were closed. One person said they think they created new movements because they worked with someone they have never worked with before.

Question 4

• Which senses were heightened or lost?
  Some people said that they lost all senses when their eyes were closed because they were concentrating on where their partner was, but others said that their sight was still in use as they used the difference of light and dark shadows to see where their partners were and their sense of touch was heightened to feel what each partner wanted to do next movement wise.

The 1,2,3 falling exercise made me feel anxious, it took me a while to be the person to be caught. I think this was down to me not feeling safe that someone would catch me in time, after I got over this it was a relief to know that I was caught and I actually found it relaxing giving all my weight into others. Catching other people gave a sense of responsibility, it felt rewarding to work as a team in order to make people feel safe. I found the fighting monkey exercise difficult when working with someone I’m not familiar with, it was hard to keep resistance against each other and to not loose contact. The transitions between the arms action going onto the back made it easier to find the connection again.

Finally the ‘Small Dance’ caused confusion with me. A question that has occurred is;
How can Small Dance be done in Contact Improvisation? Small Dance is described as the sensations of movement that happen when you find ‘stillness’ within the body. The small shifts of weight that you feel when standing still. Which proposes the question of; Is there such thing as complete stillness? The small dance exercise created a sensation of irritation and caused a burning feeling in my body at first, when we were asked to releve I found it difficult, there was no balance in my body. I think this was because our eyes were closed and I didn’t have a fixed point to concentrate on. Going into movements I don’t think that I was moving with impulses meaning that I wasn’t creating authentic movements, it was forced. This left me with a few questions;

Are we in control of our reflexes?
Why do I get irritated and burning sensations when standing still?

 

Bibliography

Once again I felt that this week was another positive week, I brought more energy and engaged with the tasks effectively. Developing the skills to release the tension in certain parts of the body (specifically the head and neck), was the challenging aspect of this week. I believe this because we hold our heads up everyday without thinking about what we are doing, trying to reverse our natural instincts is more challenging than I contemplated.

Simone Forti

Simone Forti is a student and teacher of improvisation, she was involved in the project of Judson Dance Theatre and worked with artists such as Anna Halprin and Merce Cunningham. She has worked on a dance form called Logomotion for 15 years, this explores improvisational dance that is influenced by words occurring when studying common sources.

The two videos studied in the lesson showed how research in Contact Improvisation has developed since the 1970’s, there is a significant iconic change in how we move and the form of Contact Improvisation Steve Paxton developed is not what we practice today. The first video was a showing of one of Paxton’s first performances ‘Magnesium’ (1972), where the improvisers were careless in throwing themselves onto other performers. Movements could be classed as aggressive and abrupt, in saying this there were moments of stillness to create distinction from one ‘lift’ to another whereas in the second video of Blake Nellis and Aaron Brando (Aaron Brando, 2010)movements were continuous. The two improvisers were careful in looking for points of contact that they could explore, they shard equal roles of giving and taking weight. Finally their form of Contact Improvisation was more about trial and error and if something went wrong they developed a way to get out of the movement.

Moving with the head proved to be the most challenging task… especially when partnered with Gemma, this is because I have never worked with her before and we aren’t that aware of each others bodies and personal limitations. I felt that we were repetitive with our movements as we just stood up and released back into a crouch. The other exercise where we held our partners heads was easier, Jess found it difficult to release her head and let me carry all of the weight at first. I think the responsibility of looking after another persons head was uncomfortable personally, I trusted myself that I wouldn’t drop it but the thought made me uneasy. When I had to give the weight of my head to my partner it took me a while to relax, it wasn’t until I closed my eyes that I fully gave her the weight, my movements also changed, I felt more relaxed in the space and I suppose not judged for what I was doing.

The final exercise was ‘Pebbles’, I found this relaxing, giving all of my weight into my partners back was similar to having a massage. The key aspect was to constantly keep contact with my partner, this could only be achieved if I relaxed every part of my body including my head and eyes. Engaging my eyes allowed me to read the situation and understand where I needed to place my body coming off of my partners back. This is mentioned by Daniel Lepkoff in his interview with Simone Forti (2005)  ‘Likewise, you need to move your vision to build a sense of where you are in space, you need to take a reading. Once I became aware of this activity of reading space I could allow myself to play with the way I read space, and feel and shape the rhythm of that reading’ (Lepkoff, 2005).

The reading I felt most engaged with was ‘Beginning, Approaching, Practicing, Dancing’ (Paek, S. M, 2015). It talks about the fear of unknown in Contact Improvisation and the questions that go through your head when asked to partner with someone new.

How long will you be working together?
How intimate of frightening will the task be?
Will you feel comfortable?
What will you have to do?

It reminded me of when Kirsty asks us for a partner to demonstrate something and every one goes quiet, we need to just take the opportunity to work with new people and not be afraid of the unknown, committing to what you are doing and being open to create something new with some one you have not worked with before. After all Contact Improvisation requires you to be comfortable with anything and everything that is thrown at you.

Bibliography

Forti, S. (2005) The Movement of Attention: An interview with Daniel Lepkoff : The Movement Research Performance Journal, 29 (Spring 2005). Available from http://daniellepkoff.com/writings/Daniel%20Simone%20Interview.php [accessed 15 October 2017].

Fronterad (2013) Simone Forti [image]. Available from https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=simone+forti&FORM=HDRSC2 [accessed 15 October 2017].

Paek, S M. (2015) Beginning, Approaching, Practicing, Dancing. Contact Quarterly, Vol 40: 1,pp. 36.

Tumasia (2010) Fall after newton 1 . Available from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k768K_OTePM&amp=&t=300s [accessed 15 October 2017].

I do not feel any different this week towards the concept of Contact Improvisation compared to the previous week, I am developing new skills and pushing myself to work with people I would not have necessarily worked with before. The highlight of this week surprisingly, would be the Jam on Thursday, watching how people create relationships with each other and seeing that some relationships are stronger than others encouraged me to want to work with different people in order to be comfortable about dancing with anyone, this will allow us to have strong relationships throughout the Module.

A key word that is continuously appearing in this module is the word proprioception. It is the bodies ability to sense a stimuli that impulses movement or positions in the body. In regards to Contact Improvisation proprioception is key for knowing when the right time to move yourself or your partner is, if this is not achieved correctly injuries could occur on both sides. I have experienced this in my dance training, especially in Improvisation sessions before we studied Contact Improvisation. An example of this would be when I have repeated the same movement multiple times in a row and sensing when I have exhausted this movement to the point where it could get boring for the audience, going on to me changing my movement pattern or existing the performance area completely.

Surfing and Rolling

The most important rules for this exercise were to;

• Not loose the contact with your partner otherwise the trust you have built up with each other will be lost.
• Communicate with your partner so you know the placement of your body and weight is correct.
• Use the momentum of the previous roll to take you into the next roll (never stop).
• Release your weight and relax into your partner.
• Find the ‘jigsaw’ place in your partners spine, the two backs should connect and fit together.

Doing the exercise with my eyes closed made it easier for me, it helped to forget the others around me and enabled me to concentrate on me and my partner only, I could then achieve all of the above points the best way possible. When thinking about proprioception this exercise comes into mind, especially when you are the under dancer. You need to be able to sense when your partner needs help surfing you to make the movement fluid, and if this is the case you need to roll in the direction your partner is rolling. Personally taking other people’s weight was the most comfortable role, for some of the dancers I feel too heavy to be giving all of my weight into their bodies. in the future weeks this is something that I need to work on as I know they are capable of taking my weight it is just in my head. Saying this when I was working with people similar weight to me I was fine being the over dancer.

This weeks reading was enjoyable, it explores people’s experiences of touch as a form of social interaction and how we perceive touch. The opinion that touch is the only ‘organ’ that is all over the body was the main point that stood out to me, I had never thought of this before about how every single part of your body feels touch. But are you being touched or are you touching? This is the point of reversibility and if I am being honest this point confuses me so I am keen to explore this more in future weeks.

 

Bibliography

Touch: Experience and knowledge. Full Text Available By: Bannon, Fiona; Holt, Duncan. Journal of Dance & Somatic Practices, 2012, Vol.3 Issue 1/2, p215-227.

 

To say I’m excited for Contact Improvisation is an understatement…

I can not wait to discover what contact improvisation is truly about,  how I can train my body to sense my peers intentions and feelings when moving together. To deepen my movement knowledge and self awareness of my body as a being rather than a tool.

Knowing that this week was only a taster of what is to come for the rest of the year, makes me want to push myself into every exercise and challenge that is thrown at me. This weeks class has already taught me a lot about Contact Improvisation, it has taught me that you have to think about the other person more than yourself, you have to trust who you are working with to get the best out of the class and finally that Contact Improvisation relies fundamentally on touch.

The reading ‘Moving from the Skin’ was the one I found the most interesting, I feel that it related to the class the most. This is because it relates to my point I mentioned earlier that Contact Improvisation relies mainly on touch. ‘One of the most important elements of Contact Improvisation is communication by touch, both by touching and by being touched.’ (Heitkamp, D 2003) Describing touch as a way of communicating sparks an intriguing thought of how many other ways can we communicate with each other without moving our mouths. The reading also talks about the 3 different functions of the skin. I’ve only ever thought of the skin as a layer that protects the organs and vessels within my body, but studying the reading in depth made me realise that skin is the way we communicate with others whether this is in Contact Improvisation or in everyday life. ‘In its third function, the skin-no less than the mouth- is the site and primary means of communication and development of meaningful relationships.’ (Heitkamp, D 2003)

The second reading ‘Drafting Interior Techniques’ by Steve Paxton was a fundamental reading for getting to know the history of how Contact Improvisation was formed, since Steve Paxton was the founder. Paxton describes Contact Improvisation as ‘a physical event best described negatively: not art, not sport, not most of the things that characterize dancing in this century.’ If this is the case it leaves me with the question of what exactly does the founder of Contact Improvisation best describe his way of dancing as?

As a beginner in Contact Improvisation I would describe it as a way of communicating with a person by senses such as touch, through unconventional ‘dance’ movements. I am interested to see that as I learn more about this way of moving whether my ‘definition will change or my views on Contact Improvisation. Hopefully I will not loose my excitement and interest in the subject and my want to know more and develop my skills will only become stronger.

 

Bibliography

Paxton, S. Drafting Interior Techniques. In Stark-Smith, N. A Subjective History of Contact Improvisation. In Albright, A. C., & Gere, D. (2003). Taken by surprise: A dance improvisation reader. Middletown, Conn: Wesleyan. University Press. Pp.175-184

Heitkamp, D. (2003). Moving from the Skin: An Exploratorium. Contact Quarterly/ Contact Improvisation Sourcebook II, Vol. 28:2. Pp. 256-264