Class Description

Improvising/Composing- Saturday 3- 5

This workshop will be an opportunity to get a sense of how our choices are composed in the space we are working in. What if we were to step outside the frame of our dancing together and see it as a composition? How does this frame influence our choices? Adding light and sound- we will have an opportunity to play with these ideas and consider how composition can connect us through a shared embodiment of space and time.

Loving the floor- Friday 11:30-1, Saturday 1-2:30, Sunday 3-5

Contact Improvisation as a form invites us onto the floor often. This class will lay foundations to move between laying down, up on the hands and knees into connection with a partner and back down again. We will focus on bio-mechanics, risk, trust and reciprocity with the floor and each other.

Feedom in flight -Saturday 3 - 5 (Intermediate/advanced level)

In this class we will play with spherical space by exploring the buoyancy and ease through the air and softly back down to the ground. To support the loft, we familiarize ourselves with our ever shifting centers of gravity. We listen for the nuance in weight exchange, playing with modulating tone, pressure, counterbalance and counter tensions of support. As underdancers, we investigate the multitude of ways our bodies provide surface, offering structure and agility for our partners to willingly and harmoniously perch or hitch a ride.

Embodied Dimensions / An exploration into the felt experience of our dancing self- Sunday 6-7:30

This class will blend practices of dance improvisation, contact improvisation, and somatic movement approaches. The underlying curiosity of this class looks to tune our senses and attention in order to more fully map our inner experience of our physical self, uncover obscured perceptions, yield to our discoveries, and articulate the intricacies of expression.

The Evolution of Flight: Technique Class: Saturday 10:00 - 12

We really can fly. Timing, ease and levity are our wings. With patience, deeper listening and alignment with our earth to core connection, our contact dance takes flight. In this class we will learn specific techniques , “tricks of the trade” you could say, that will deepen our awareness of the principals that allow for effortless flight.

*You must have at least 4 years contact experience or equivalent movement practice to participate in this class.

Flow: Perceptual Dynamism: Sunday 3 - 5

What is flow? Does to flow mean we never stop? Does it mean we make everything look seamless and graceful? Or is flow a state of body/mind? And how does it relate to our contact dancing?

In my experience flow is a state – a state of deep immersion – in which we ride the currents of change and complexity with greater and greater degrees of sophistication. Flow comes when we align our attention to the present moment, let go of any judgments, notions or interpretations of ‘good and bad’ in our dancing and simply rest in the dynamic flow of perceptutal change.

Open to all levels.

Authentic Relating and Unmasking: Friday 11:30 - 1:00

This will be a class to build connection and get to know each other’s movement. We will share some authentic movement and mirroring games, tell our stories to each other and have a nice long cypher to really drop in with each other

Compositional Meets Improvisational and Everything in Between: Sunday 10 - 12:00

Joni’s class will bring together her love of breath-work, zen and the study of “spontaneity”.. She will explore the notion of listening as a somatic contemplative practice cultivating:

*listening to the floor with our body and

*listening to our partner at all kinds of different layers: listening to the bony body, the muscle and sinew body, and finally the skin body.

*listening to our self and our impulses as they arise. We will try and locate the source of our impulses. Are they arising authentically? Are we “put them on” or “listening them into action”

This will be a low slow flow class nourishing for the nervous system and calming for the body.

Saturday 1 - 2:30

Expanding the Fitting and Contouring work Cyrus Is known for, the workshop will explore multi-responsive and 360o adaptivity and awareness, examining for ourselves what makes us feel “in the flow” for more fulfilled and engaged dancing.

Sunday 1-3

In this intermediate level workshop, we will work with partners (duets, trios, etc.) to explore ways to increase our innate adaptive learning capacity within a dance. We will playfully engage with different levels of responsiveness, touch/weight, and tonality. We will look at resistance and yielding, weighting and unweighting, as well as traditional and non-traditional anatomic supports with less-used body surfaces. We will look at elements of tracing and tracking for the individual dancer to greater flow and increase smooth transfer in and out of the floor and partners.

Friday 6 - 7:30

For this end of day session, we will share some led partner body work to release and unwind.

From this softer place, we will explore how reduced tone and speed can invite deeper listening to the more subtle and nuanced movements in ourselves and our partners.

Saturday 3 - 5

Sunday 10 - 12

Our process will integrate and mobilize the whole body and will include set movement material as well as exploring the physicality engendered in your own movement. We will focus on embodied presence via the support of the breath, the light release of the skeleton, the sinuous vitality of the musculature and the emotive nature of the organs.

The somatic processes of the Bartenieff Movement Fundamentals and the developmental movement patterns are the basis of the work.

http://helenwalkley.com

Class 1 - Friday 11 :30 - 1 Beginner

In this Friday morning workshop we will explore the fundamentals on CI.

We'll be exploring weight sharing, point of rolling contact, changing levels, moving from centre, and how to participate in jams. Perfect for new comers or dancers wishing to get a bit more familiar with the bread and butter of the form.

Class 2 - Sunday 10 - 12

Intermediate/Advanced

What happens when we move into unknown spaces, where the eyes can only meet the peripherals, leaving us into an obscured perfume?

In this workshop, we’ll be initiating from the back space. With skin, spine, head, and eyes material, we’ll be growing sensitivity, falling from heights, getting inverted, playing with disorientation, and accessing polycentricity.

Dancing the layers in the Basics: Friday 6 - 8:00

Depth and clarity that can support both the beginner and the experienced CI practitioner to access themselves and their partner in relation to each other, the movement principles and the richness of the dances. For the experienced practitioner, the phenomenal experience we first encountered as beginners of 'sharing the dance' with another, can expand to less familiar states, qualities and the imagination in the dancing. The simple yet complex practices of 'the Stand/small dance' (Steve Paxton), 'head to head' dance,etc, can continue to inspire and nurture ourselves and our art practice.

Photo credit: Anne Cooper & Monica Strehlke in City of Crows/EDAM. Photo by Chris Randle

Falling to flight - Sunday 6-7:30

This class looks into group dynamics. We will experience new ways of connecting, which allow us to create together.. We will create assemble work using parameters that guide us in unique possibilities.We explore making choices to support the space and the group. Another dimension in this is witnessing each other in various group sizes. Come explore making content and co-creating with others.

Friday 6-7:30 - Indulging | The minutiae of our perception in Contact Improvisation

We will indulge in the range of our senses, the energetic circumferences of our bones and tapping into imagination. We will dive into perceptual possibilities of what it feels like to engage in contact dance with ourselves and inhabiting personal suppleness that translates into dances with others. We will dance in different duets to explore how letting go of tension and expectation can lead to flourishing creativity within each dance. We will work on conscious duetting and tuning into the layers of our perception by yielding, pressure modulation, internal expansion and graceful weigh-sharing to sharpen our physical awareness and dexterity.

Saturday 10-12 - Indulging | The Dimensions of Imagination in Contact Improvisation

In this class, we will bring the value of agility and tactility to awaken our inner CATS. We will dive into exploring how the physical skillsets we already know can expand through indulging in the range of our senses, the energetic circumferences of our bones, noticing emotions and tapping into imagination. Can imagination guide us to inhabit our bodies of knowledge and generosity? This leads us into dreaming the body and the extensions of our bodies as a way of expanding and exceeding the physical body. This class will invite us to dive into perceptual possibilities of what it feels like to awaken and develop our imagination as a way of bridging the unconscious to the conscious in contact improvisation. We will work on enhancing personal suppleness and virtuosity, tuning into the perception within the group, and utilizing the group's intelligence. Can imagination guide us to dance the unimaginable dances with others?

Deep Listening- Saturday- 1-2:30

Drawing on developmental movement patterns and skills of Contact Improvisation, this class will be accessible for all levels of movers. We will start on the floor with a gentle somatic-based warm up that will help the body to feel gravity. Growing from the floor to standing, we will practice smoothing out our transitions into upright dancing. Contact skills of reach, push, pull, fall, sluff, glide and roll will all be employed, using the floor as your loyal partner. If you are sometimes lost at class or jams, this class will provide codified skills and set “moves” that are important to learn so that you can use them in the dance. For example, how to get on a body with a low, medium or high shelf, and how to get back off. The goal is an aware, alert, and embodied presence that uses the full capacity of the dancer as a human being awake in the word. More sensitivity is reached through relaxing the nervous system. More alertness is reached through waking up the mind with moment-by-moment choice making. More embodiment is reached through a deep listening to the relationship to the earth, each other, and the space around us.

Spectrum and Polarity: the music of the spheres - Saturday 10-12

Regardless of skill, fitness, body size or ability level, all of us have physical limits to our movement capacity. Yet, within the bounds of those limitations there exist infinite avenues of exploration. In this workshop, we will play along the axes of apparent opposition between diads such as: contraction and extension; compression and suspension; intention and surprise; initiation and response; space and time; form and emptiness.

By expanding our sensory, kinesthetic and aesthetic awareness of self and surrounding, we access a wider range of improvisational possibilities--with self, with partners and with life.

Saturday 3 - 5

Deep Stretch and Sound Bath

Dive Deep- Friday 2-4, Sunday 1-3

These CI Dance classes sufficiently explore our potentially unexplored psycho-emotional aspects within specific interrelational movement.

We’ll dive deep into our internal landscape whilst relating, our unknown, unexpected, surprising aspects of physical & energetic relating, exploring how these experiences affect & change us, as we confront more uncomfortable, yet exciting & relieving mental/emotional truisms.

We’ll gently choose partners with highly intuitional guidance that potentially trigger our patterns, giving us ample chance to move through any stuck internal places with the help of exact experiential awareness.

This guided process is meant to enhance our personal evolution/development quickly & safely.

All levels welcome.

1st class concentrates on how we feel in relation to specific others in a safe protected space, whilst moving our stuff gently, so not a pain in the ass to feel. We practice this deeply & easily.

2nd class focuses on how we feel, but delves deeper into moving our stuff safely whilst "blaming" others for our predicament, taking more responsibility for moving where we are, so again, it's not a pain in the ass to relate/connect, rather, empowering

Clown Bodies- Friday 2-4

In this class, you are guided through exercises from the world of clown that develop your self-awareness, impulse fluency, and emotional freedom. Your body will find support and encouragement from its own delight. We will ultimately explore how our new emotional freedom interfaces with others in contact. No previous experience required.

Sensing the Dance: Contact Improv and the Art of Embodied Relating- Sunday 1-4 (with Sashah Klapkiw)

In this 4-hour workshop, we will explore the art of CI through the lens of relational somatics and polyvagal theory to deepen our understanding of how our nervous system works and how it supports our experience of the dance. This trauma-informed workshop has been designed to inspire dancers and movement enthusiasts of all levels. Bring your curiosity; together, we will explore connection and creativity in a supportive and playful environment.

Sensing the Dance: Contact Improv and the Art of Embodied Relating- Sunday 1-4 (with Natalie Rousseau)

In this 4-hour workshop, we will explore the art of CI through the lens of relational somatics and polyvagal theory to deepen our understanding of how our nervous system works and how it supports our experience of the dance. This trauma-informed workshop has been designed to inspire dancers and movement enthusiasts of all levels. Bring your curiosity; together, we will explore connection and creativity in a supportive and playful environment.

Ecstatic Dance- Friday 7:30-9, Sunday 6-7:30

Friday 2-4- Vocal Contemplation and Composition in CI (all levels)

Listening induced Silence is a gift in the dance. We will explore how audible and inaudible vocalizations could deepen that silence. We may start with somatic exploration of breath and vocal musculature (30 min) Research how movement of the limbs may relate to our voice (10 min) Dive into compositional scores and structured vocal improvisations while moving in and out of contact (50 min) and take kinesthetic delight in synchronicity of our reflexes while doing a mini jam/underscore integrating the vocal elements (30 min).