Throughout this session we referred to one of our readings The Movement Of Attention an interview with Daniel Lepkoff by the postmodern dancer Simone Forti. In this reading he discusses that the head, eyes and breathe are in constant motion. Even when your eyes are closed they are in constant motion. He also talks about feeling and reading the space “when you walk through a door, there is a “reading” that you take” (Lepkoff, 2005, 3), this was so important, you should feel the space, feel where you are, read the space and make yourself aware of where you are and where your about to perform. In class we made contact with another person (Chloe) and we were only allowed to make contact with that body part, trying to explore movements and staying in constant motion with each other was difficult and challenging for us both, but because we have the trust and connection with each other already we did manage to find ways of moving in and around each other whilst doing this which was helpful for me.
Was our moves creative?
We also rested our head in a different partner hands (Hannah) allowing them to take all of our weight.
Did my partner have my head supported properly?
Did I trust my partner?
In fact, I did trust my partner, although I haven’t worked with Hannah much in contact we have a good relationship outside of dance which allowed trust to format fairly quick. I felt like I did have the confidence in her to take care of me and not drop my head.
The last part of the session we finally started to take each other’s body weight which related to a video we had watched earlier on in the session which was Steve Paxstons Magnism, the founder of contact improvisation himself. This was such a chaotic number and the dancers were weight baring so much which relates to our pebble and roll over the back which eventually turned into head stand over table top. We didn’t exactly throw ourselves on top each other like the video we watched but we got to the stage of weight baring on each other was fun and exciting as it was something new. It felt like we had taken that next step to doing more creative and challenging lifts. We were encouraged like every week to work with different people which is what I did, even if some people I didn’t have the best trust or relationship with. Kye was really hard to work with on the last exercise (head stand over table top) as he is a lot taller than me therefore I had to create a lot of momentum and trust in order to get over his back safely.
Can they take my body weight?
Will they drop me?
Have I created enough momentum to get over Kye or not?
One reading in particular stood out to me the most which was Essentials. By Margaret Sunghe Paek, Beginning, Approaching, Practicing, Dancing. This reading I felt was so relatable to me and out of any described the way I was feeling in contact and what actually happens during the lesson. She talks about how in a lesson we would instantly run to a friend if a teacher was to say grab a partner, but in fact although we picked our friend out to work with our bodies in the space might not work well together. Trying to work with different people to find them connections with different bodies. Paek also mentions that the unknowns Is actually creativity and that not knowing what’s going to happen next is a great way of pushing the boundaries and creating different movements with different people.
Bibliography-
Forti, S. (2005) The Movement of Attention. The Movement Research Performance Journal, 29 (Spring), Available from http://daniellepkoff.com/writings/Daniel%20Simone%20Interview.php [accessed 15 October 2017]
Paek, S. M, (2015) Beginning, approaching, practicing, dancing. Contact Quarterly, Vol 40: 1, pp. 36.
Klubika (2011) contact improvisation 1972
. Availbale from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FeSDsmIeHA&t=1s[accessed 10 october 2017]