John Faichney and Anne Cooper will lead this 12 day intensive with arrival on Sunday, June21. First class is Monday at 10am sharp. There will be 10 days of classes and two days of rest. The last class is Friday, July3 followed by the final jam. This workshop ends after breakfast on Saturday 4th. All meals, dormitory, camping, rides to and from the the Lasqueti ferry-$725
Contact Improvisation makes a place for many different kinds of conversation, and in John’s class we will try-out a number of different modes of CI ‘speech’. Some of these will exploit game-like and/or martial-arts-like structures, while others will work both with and against sound. However, we will be particularly interested in duets organized around (1) rolling, contiguous, single-point touch (a.k.a., ‘RCSPT’); (2) the ambiguity (agreement,dispute,open-endedness) of who has the initiative for ‘what happens next’; and (3) particular configurations or qualities of movement which emerge, if only for a moment, as a shared topic for duet partners’ curiosity.
We will be particularly concerned to become comfortable and resourceful with RCSPT. Thinking about CI this way, it is as though duet partners were oriented to ‘writing on’ and being ‘written on by’ each other’s body-surfaces. In fact, it is because of RCSPT that dancers are able to ‘keep up with each other’ – that is, sustain high-quality communication regardless of what the other dancer is doing. From this base, we will seek out the invitation-and-reply that happens when we resist, exceed, and pivot against our partner’s touch trajectories.
In general, we will explore the space between, on the one hand, how CI grounds itself in a process of awakening the body to its own intuitive grasp of movement/touch – its poise, balance, extension, tactility, weight, inertia, and so on – and on the other hand, how skillful CI seems to consolidate itself around particular habits of movement/touch. (Sometimes CI is much like other forms of dance training: some habits we awaken and refine; others we learn through focus and practice.) Our aim, throughout, will be to develop each dancer’s unique ‘voice’: those individualised qualities of CI ‘speech’ which emerge in touch/movement dialogue.
John Faichney studied dance at Oberlin College (USA), graduating in 1975. He performed in Steve Paxton’s proto-Contact-Improvisation work, Magnesium (1972), and, from 1973, pursued CI in parallel with choreography, group improvisation, and music theory. In 1976 he created a series of solo dances (including, for a European tour, Mutatis mutandis) which merged CI-inspired rolling technique and structuralist compositional principles.From 1979 to 1985, he was rehearsal director for Susan Macpherson, whose touring show, A personal collection, featured commissioned work by internationally-recognized choreographers. Since that time, John’s practice of CI has emphasized its resemblance to ordinary conversation, and, particularly, how specific mindfulness and techniques catalyse its full potential as ‘both-speaking-at-once / both-listening-at-once’ dialogue.
John is returning to Leviathan Studio for the 6th time. He has taught CI workshops at Leviathan Studio with Anne Cooper (2010), Eryn Dace Trudell (2011), Jennifer Mcleish-Lewis (2012), and Mark Young (2013,14)
Anne Cooper will lead us through Material For the Spine including crescent and spiral rolls, puzzles and undulation. Anne will present Nancy Stark Smith’s ‘Underscore’ along with the Small dance, on feet disorientation and falling off centre to enable lifts. There will exercises involving floor work with an emphasis on sequential flow.
Anne Cooper has performed for over eighteen years in an eclectic mix of dance companies in Winnipeg, Quebec and Vancouver. She has been a company member of EDAM since 1994, dancing contact-inspired choreography. Anne also creates her own works, combining choreography, improvisation and the spoken word. A graduate of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet school, Anne has also trained in contemporary dance, voice and theatre.
To register go to ‘Contact Us’ on the right side of this screen and send an email. Please put June21 in the subject line.
