Blog Entry- Week 9.

The act of improvising: creating something spontaneously or without preparation.

The improvisation module was one that I was looking forward to before it began, although apprehensive to begin with, I have enjoyed this module thoroughly for the duration. In the first few weeks, I felt that I fell behind with the practice and I was noticing habitual movement in my own body for longer than I felt I should, so I think it took me a long time to work with the idea of improvisation and all the different methods as I missed quite a lot. Observing the classes was obviously not as beneficial as practical but I felt like I was learning a lot from watching how the other dancers moved and being able to identify habitual movement in them and watch them develop and embody the methods.

Working with the idea of internalisation was an idea that took a long time to work in my body and to fully understand. I always envisioned movement as something that you could physically see and was aesthetically pleasing to watch and the improvisation module has changed that in my body as I always try to feel the origin of the movement first and comprehend where it is moving through in my body.

Reflecting on the different classes in the module, one of my favourite aspects were the Improvisation Jams. I enjoyed the idea of exploring the different methods we’d learnt in the class and applying what we’ve learnt in other classes. Without sounding obvious, there were different outcomes in each jam and I came to appreciate the different movement qualities in each of the dancers in the space and start learning from them, even taking ideas and applying different methods to their movement. There were dancers in the space who I really came to work well with and I felt like I created a relationship with them where I was able to physically communicate my ideas and vice versa.

Working with isolation of the body parts is something I have found very useful in solo improvisation, it has given me a starting point and I constantly find new ways of moving and different pathways. I also find it useful when I am echoing another dancer’s movement and I am able to develop it and change it by embodying the movement in different parts of my body.

Thick Skinning is a method that I really enjoy as I like working with other bodies and getting inspiration from their movement and learning how the other bodies like to move. I think it is a good method to start to understand spatial awareness while moving in the space with other dancers.

Scores were introduced to us at the very beginning of the module and were a concept that I never really took to throughout. I found most of the scores very restricting, even when we were creating them ourselves. I appreciate that these scores enabled us to create some very interesting movement throughout the time and I found other people’s ideas very interesting and I enjoyed seeing the movement that we could create with the score but the scores are something that I find very difficult to get to grips with and I feel like I get stuck in my own body and struggle to work with the restrictions to my advantage. I feel like working more with scores and being more open minded about the outcomes when I am dancing I feel that I would enjoy them a lot more and I would create a lot more interesting movement.

I feel like I have learnt a lot about my body from this module and I have been able to explore different things that I would never have tried to do with my body before and tried to stay with the movement that I have worked with for years. After this module, I feel like I will be more confident in creating material for future choreography that will be new and explorative.

Blog Eight- 6/4/

This was our first class back after Easter and we spent some time to come back into our bodies so we just lay on the floor and focused on our breathing. We had freedom to move through our bodies, going into downward dog and table top, just finding different positions to stretch through our bodies and warm up.

We were given instructions in ways to move like leading with the elbow, keep the left foot on the floor, no use of arms & then legs. I find that this way moving really helps with finding different ways to move and thinking more about individual body parts and not the entire body. This also helps with working away from my habitual movement. I don’t feel any familiar movement in my body when I use this method.

This class felt very different in my body compared to the previous class, I was interested in finding new movement and different sensations in my body and not worrying about habitual movement because I wasn’t tempted to revert back to that type of movement. I need to work on exploring internalisation more as I find that it’s an interesting and new way of moving but I need to work into my body a bit more, in the final lesson I am going to try and think more about internalisation in my movement. A quote from Landscape of the Now “the audience offer an energetic platform to be inside of” (Spain, K, 2014) as the reason that the class felt different this week is because I wasn’t really focusing on anyone else’s body, just what movement I was creating, and therefore wasn’t really concentrating on who was watching me. This made a big difference in my movement as I didn’t feel as restricted or conscious, I was just working with the idea of accumulation and what I felt was interesting in my body despite how it appeared aesthetically.

We created our own scores from looking at underscores in an RSVP cycle.

All bodies in the space, each of the different sections was done for two minutes. After one minute, we added a component to get different results.

Collision – with eyes shut & backwards blinking.

Contrast – change pace.

Idiot Button

Confluence – dynamics and thick skinning.

We then had to ask the dancers questions:

Because there was a different starting point each time, was it hard to stay away from habitual movement?

-Yes because it was fast paced and there were quick changes and not a of time to think or fully think about the instructions.

How did you find the score? Was it difficult to follow?

-It was quite confusing. Quite restricting with movement.

This feedback was useful as I enjoyed seeing the different bodies in the space and how they were reacting to our score. Even seeing some confusion and uncertainty in their movement and watching them work through it. The feedback section was interesting as there were reactions to the score that I didn’t notice by watching them and felt that it was interesting to hear how they felt about it.

Blog 16/3

The class started very similar to any other, we began by walking round the room making eye contact with other dancers, just trying to collect awareness of everyone else in the space and trying to find a connection with them. Collectively, we had to stop moving and start again with no vocalisation, similar to what we have done before, which I noticed that we’d improved on and I felt that we were able to use each other’s energies more than we had previously.

We then got into a clump and had to separate for another body coming through us, which meant we had to be aware of how everyone else was moving and our reaction to that. We had to be able to sense when the clump was moving in order to initiate the reaction at the right time for the bodies to perform the task.

Then in two groups, we had to cross each other at the same pace and within the same time. Which means that there had to be a collective awareness of what the other group and your own group were doing, we needed to be able to react quickly to where each body was in order to avoid collisions.

We were then exploring kinespheres and started by travelling across the room using:

– low kinesphere which I found enjoyable and explorative as I enjoy working in and out of the floor and enjoyed looking for new ways to use the floor in my movement.

– middle kinesphere which wasn’t easy for me at first as I struggled to differentiate between what was classed as low or high, I enjoyed this though as I was able to explore other movements without switching kinespheres.

– high kinesphere I felt was hard to stay away from habitual as there are very few explorations that I discovered and I wasn’t able to improvise quick enough. I felt like I needed more work on that one as it didn’t come as easy to me as the others and I would like to explore that more.

– combination of the three was the one I enjoyed the most as I was able to move more freely and didn’t feel any restrictions to explore anything that I found interesting in my body.

We then had to focus on introducing stillness, slow-motion and bursts of energy which, at first, was difficult to focus on as I had just got comfortable in my body with exploring the different kinespheres, but I found that I particularly like the stillness and slow- motion as I found that I was able to look for different sensations in my body that I enjoyed and was then able to explore them. After finding a movement that felt good in our bodies, we were asked to explore it. From a few weeks back, I enjoyed the isolation of the body parts and I feel like that is something that I really like exploring. So in our development, I was leading with my left elbow and I found different movements through opposition of body parts, for example, my right knee and finding different feelings in the movement that I enjoyed.

“In order to make rituals that create change, we need to remain in an experimental mode, whilst holding fast to the elements our rituals are weighted in time” (Halprin, 1995)

‘Does habitual movement ever stop? Does it ever leave your body? Is it possible to do a full improv class without habitual movement?’

Anna Halprin discusses the use of scores as a structure for a performance. We created our own scores in groups based on our question and the RSVP cycle:

Resources: Instruments- Drums, Glockenspiel.

Scores: No more than six people in the space at a time, every drum beat is a switch/change in number of people in the space, glockenspiel, stillness and the group is to work together and find movement together, clap- body part of their choice stays in contact with the floor.

Our score highlighted how reluctant some dancers were to enter the space and if I was to recreate this score I would have everyone dancing altogether to alleviate the pressure that some people feel. I also think that it would’ve been helpful in our score if we had stated the body parts so we could compare different movements and find similarities between them.

Blog Entry 9/03

Our class started with the walk around the space like normal, becoming aware of our surroundings and learning to become comfortable with the other bodies in the space “the link between dancers… it occurs not only by means of actions but also of emotions” (Ribero, M and AGAR, F, 2011,) and Kirsty encourages us to work with the idea of collective intelligence even when just walking round the space, as working together to pick up the pace in the warming of our bodies with relate to the pace consistency we are trying to achieve in our improv jams.

We got into pairs for the swiping exercise on three different planes. I found this method enjoyable as I enjoy working with other people and I was able to notice in my own movement and was able to sense the movement of my partner. Similarly, in previous lessons I struggled to concentrate when the movements matched and it became a bit frantic and I think this is something I really need to work on in terms of improving my improvisation and partner work, particularly in preparation for contact improvisation in second year.

In different pairs, we worked on the same swiping movements, but moving across the room and one of the pair had to work on dodging the other swipe. I found this quite difficult as I wanted to look for different ways to dodge my partner’s arms and found myself resorting to ones that I had already used. We repeated this method, but with the swiper’s eyes closed, which as the dodger, didn’t really change but to have your eyes closed was very difficult. This was because you couldn’t sense the body around you unless there was some form of collision, and I felt more hesitant as I wasn’t sure where the other body was.

In the same partners, we had to copy our partner’s movement across the floor which I didn’t feel was particularly challenging as I was able to view the whole movement and predict where the movement was going or what was coming next “How is it possible to make a shared choice of movements during improvisation between two or more dancers, without previous agreement and without communication through words?” (Ribero, M and AGAR, F, 2011). This changed however, when the partners were creating new movement and there was no way of predicting their next movement as you were trying to figure it out in your own body.

We came out of partners and starting moving around the room, blinking and trying to take a picture of where you were going and trying to avoid the other bodies in the room. This felt surprisingly comfortable and a lot less difficult than I anticipated, I easily adjusted to the pictures that I was mentally taking and I was aware of the space and the length of time I had left to move before needing to reopen my eyes. We tried this method, with movement across the room by trying to copy our partner which I found the most difficult and was completely unaware of the movement my partner was doing, and what I was doing was completely different.

Back into partners, we used impulse touch from a previous lesson and experimented with the different pressure of touch and how it contributed to their movement. We were then given different images, like in the previous lesson:

Seaweed: This movement was quite clingy and there was a prolonged pressure on my partner, even physically moving the body parts with the pressure and it felt fairly easy to embody the image, using the texture in your movement.

Kitten: This image was quite playful and we created contact between other parts of the body, like the nose to impulse the movement. Some of the reactions to this were sharp dynamics, and a lot of jumpy movements.

Wrestler: This one was quite powerful and the points of contact were over a bigger surface area and a lot of powerful. The touch was more intense and the movements generated were a lot heavier than the seaweed or kitten.

Bibliography:

Ribeiro, M. Fonseca, A. (2011) The empathy and the structuring sharing modes of movement sequences in the improvisation of contemporary dance. Research in Dance Education.

Blog: 2/3

We started in lines of five set behind each other with a jumping exercise to find some awareness of our bodies at the start of the class and see how well we can work as a collective, finding stillness in different parts of the task. We then went into the space to get used to our surroundings like the beginning of most lessons, as a way of finding our own stiffness and to start moving, it also helps us gain awareness of each other whilst moving. We were given instructions: fold, favourite, centre and look which helped us start to work with each other whilst moving and be attentive in the space.

Imagery.

We were all set to improvise using different images to focus our movement on. For example:

-legs as knives

-head and tailbone touch

-arms as spaghetti

-nose lower than lower body

-cells in the body racing

I found this particularly interesting for my body as I wasn’t able to use most of my habitual movement as it didn’t relate to the image. I thought it was a good way to move away from that kind of movement and maybe venture into other dynamics or shapes that you would never have thought to use, “inhabit their visualization” (Buckwalter, 2010). I preferred to use to ‘cells racing’ image as I was able to incorporate my whole body in that movement and I wasn’t restricted to any particular body part.

We were separated into groups and each chose one of the above to use.

Group One – Cells Racing

I noticed that it was less habitual, which was something that I’d noticed in my own body and that the dynamics between all the dancers were very similar, the pace didn’t vary until the dancers became out of breath. If the movement was to be more internalised for this image “visualizing is often a difficult skill to learn… people ‘visualize’ differently, combining different senses” (Buckwalter, 2010), then breathlessness could be prevented and the image could be sustained for longer.

Group Two- Legs as knives

I had little observation for this one except that we spent a lot of the time on the floor as it felt easier to move our legs around the way we had envisioned and used a lower kinesphere.  Like group one, each dancer in the group had similar dynamics, we used sharp dynamics with our image.

“The dance is a direct experiencing of the image rather that its imitation through movement.” (Buckwalter, 2010)

We were given methods to start changing our improvisations within scores: accumulation, diminishment, retrograde and echoing. This is something I need to start imbedding in my memory whilst improving as a need to remember other methods that will make my improvisation more spontaneous and less monotonous.

Thick Skinning.

We learnt this method as a way of staying close to another body and using energy off them in your own improvisation. [ENTER VIDEO] I think it is strange to see bodies connecting with each other and using others without it being a choreographed duet and there being very little awareness of where the body will be going next. There is also the idea of bodies connecting and working together whilst being spatially apart, which I think is quite interesting as it resonates as a method that we have already touched upon so we will already have some experience in this, but we just have to develop it. The pace was noticeably slower than other improvisations I’d watched, which is something that I have to be aware of as I am working with other bodies and have to be aware of the in order to remain safe.

When we used thick skinning in a group improvisation, I found this method particularly difficult as I wasn’t sure how comfortable other dancers were with the idea and how much movement I was allowed without it breaching into contact improvisation. Throughout, I found the line very difficult to comprehend and sometimes withdrew on some movements that I felt I wanted to explore as I was worried I was pushing into the contact barrier. This method is a lot easier with people that you have a connection with, I found that I was particularly experimental with Emily as we are able to predict each other’s movement fairly easily and we have an awareness of each other with no drawbacks. I find some people in the group more difficult to do this kind of method with that others as if I’m not fully aware of their movement, I am slightly apprehensive about what they are comfortable with.

This method highlighted for me that I need to work on my concentration skills in improvisation when I get stuck in a certain place or run out ideas and when I do run out of ideas, I struggle to stay connected with my partner and see if I can get any inspiration from them or let them lead the movement.

Bibliography

Buckwalter, M., 2010. Composing while dancing: An improviser’s companion. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.