Thoughts for preparing an intermediate/advanced CI workshop in Warsaw In my teaching I usually focus a lot on how to keep the shared weight moving while dancing through all spacial levels. How do we lift each other and how do we get smoothly and safely to the floor are core questions? In this workshop I […]
When the fear begins we almost automatically fall into established habits. For improvising, learning and growing personally we need to be able to notice the upcomming fear, we need to look for the discomfort and research alternative options – which can be actually fun.
Soeben hatte ich bei einer recht bewegenden Grinberg Sitzung plötzlich einen Moment von Klarheit und ich sagte: „Deshalb tanze ich wahrscheinlich!“
I am constantly amazed about the impact that the focus on the sensations under the skin has in my work. So often it becomes the turning point from ‘having a good time and learning a lot’ to ‘something is really happening’. It just happened again on the 7th Madrid Contact Festival and I was surprised […]
At the moment everyone seems to love the fascia, the revolution. Something – that was always neglected or at least underestimated in its importance – becomes the all connecting hero, the salvation for everything, like back pain, headaches, the immune system, more functional movements….
I have big doubts about beforming Improvisation, especially Contact Improvisation. Under the pressure of satisfying the audience’s needs we easily fall back into our fear patterns and start doing childish or selfish things nobody really needs to see. I am grateful when I have the opportunity to understand more deeply, the motivations and traps in […]
This text is part of my preparation for a Contact Workshop I taught in Marseille (January 25/26 2014). I wanted to focus on something that helps exploring the basics (spine) but that included something more specific and also challenging for my own teaching (head & tale).
Most people who have practiced CI will have been confronted with the word or concept of ‘witnessing’. And I guess the vast majority was – at least in the beginning – irritated. I use the term ‘witnessing’ quite a lot in my teaching but I still struggle with the word. It sounds so sterile and […]
One interest in my dancing is to be light, to not be a burden for my dance partner. Maybe a wish that – even though we are sharing weight – moving for my dance partner doesn’t physically be heavier than moving alone. I don’t want to know which terrifying aspects of my personality a psycho […]
Why it is not enough to do the right shape or to try to relax? In the context of Contact Improvisation, somatic work and contemporary dance most people are probably familiar with phrases like ‘the spine floats upwards’ or ‘the tale can hang, the sacrum rests, the sternum softens downwards’ … I am very used […]
