In the first decades of the development of contact improvisation a unique style emerged from California to Vancouver. A dialect that might be called “West Coast Style.”
If you watch the dancing at a west coast jam you are likely to see more of a shared plumb line, more weight exchange, often with quick changes of roles– the supporter going into flight and the flyer becoming the support. There is a blending of centers that encourages near weightlessness and the spontaneous acrobatics of the form. You are also more inclined to see people having an angry dance, a sexual dance or a tearful dance.
In this five-day lab we will play with this physicality while asking the question – How do I bring more of myself to this dance form?
We will investigate:
• moving from a base of sensation
• we will play with a more weighted contact point
• with a strongly shared center
• that has an ease going off balance
• to spend more time in disorientation
• finding spontaneous pathways into the acrobatics of the form
With games, some sweat, and the unique physicality of the contact body we will savour and rock the boundaries between states of allowing and mindful intention.
We will also work with the CONTACT BODY
Some Qualities of the contact body:
* Pliant strength
* Supple and resilient
* Organised and released
* Limbs that move autonomously from one another
* Ability to see and move into the backspace
* A visceral understanding of the spiral
* Breath that is felt from the ground to the marrow
* An enhanced capacity for sensation and pleasure
Martin KeoghSabine Parzer
