Contact Punkte 2 – „Subtlety and complexity in Contact Improvisation“

In this workshop we will take a closer look at the layers of complexity and levels of subtleness in this evolving dance form. We will aim to cultivate an ease and gracefulness in those crossing fields while maintaining an inquisitive mind. We will work with tuning our own experience and innate presence while allowing our attention to play with awareness, sensation, perception, imagination, influence and reaction in order to create an intimate sense of connectedness, ease and spaciousness between them.

Including introspection and dialogue as we go, we will deepen our understanding of the micro-dynamics and fine points that reveal themselves in our dancing as we practice different states and qualities of improvising. Encouraging our performing skills to come into play, we scrutinize how we sense, see and are seen by each other. How do we act with a sense of clarity as we move? How do we witness others and ourselves in the subtle and small range and in the bigger, wider range?

Bring curiosity, a keen desire to dance and a willingness to see and be seen.

This workshop is open to all with some basic experience in CI.

Jori Snell is a physical performing-and visual artist from Holland/Denmark (1972). She works as a freelance performer, improviser, director and teacher in Europe, transforming her training in physical theatre, contact improvisation (CI), butoh/martial arts and visual arts into a personal language. Companies she has worked with are: Odin Teatret (DK), Teatret OM (DK), Corona la Balance/ZeBU(DK) and Panthéâtre (Roy Hart Theatre, FR). Between 2008-2016, she was based in Cape Town, South Africa, creating works for/with companies such as FTH:K & Ubom! (Physical/Visual Theatres) and Remix Dance Company (Mixed Ability Dance). She initiated and sustained the CI scene in Cape Town. Her inspiration in CI and Improvisation has come from her work with Andrew de Lotbinière Harwood, Kirstie Simson, Katie Duck, Lucia Walker, Ray Chung, Nancy Stark Smith and many others.
In her work and teaching she aims to bring alive an authentic expression in body, mind and space, moving between dance, myth & poetry with a love for spontaneous, alive and improvised image-making.

Andrew de Lotbinière Harwood is an internationally recognized pioneer and master teacher of contact improvisation. He began his dance career in 1975 and for over forty three years has dedicated himself to the research, education, development and dissemination of contact improvisation and real-time composition as sophisticated movement disciplines and performing art forms. Formerly artistic director of AH HA Productions (2000-2014) his work has evolved through collaborations with many renowned dancers (Nancy Stark Smith, Steve Paxton, Lisa Nelson, Ray Chung, Kirstie Simson, Julyen Hamilton, Chris Aiken, Benoît Lachambre, Peter Bingham and Jori Snell among many others) and through various investigations of performance, composition, spatial design and movement techniques. Passionate about teaching, he transforms his training in gymnastics, athletics, the Alexander Technique, Aikido, release technique, contemporary dance, yoga and various somatic practices into a personal language, which he has shared throughout the world since 1976. He was awarded the prestigious Canada Council’s Jacqueline Lemieux Award in 2000.