We hebben ook dit keer weer studenten, alumni en docenten van ArtEZ verzameld wiens werk raakt aan de thematiek van ons festival. Zij bloggen in aanloop naar het festival Lost in Transition. Dit keer is de beurt aan Laura Saumweber, student aan de Dansacademie.
The in-between: Searching, looking for a balance, creating a centre together, stability meets instability, sensitivity and constant transitions. Where am I? Where is my partner? Where is the group and what are my possibilities? Who am I in this sudden moment of motion?
Phenomena of touch – physical trust through Contact Improvisation
“The supportive and trusting attitude of CI encourages acknowledging our impulses and tendencies, conforming who we are in the very moment of becoming, a simple act with profound consequences“ (Cherly Pallant). In Contact Improvisation the human body acts and reacts quite intuitively and on a high level of listening. Internally you are constantly listening and sensing while the body immediately translates the information into movement. It is a dance form in which two or more bodies explore together the kinaesthetic possibilities which occur through physical contact.
Two bodies in motion, one dialogue. A first touch. They are melting into each other, merging, getting one body. They are flying. They let each other fly. There is no gap, no interruption. Complete awareness, total sensitivity. Fluidity, like liquid- filling and surrounding the human body. Connecting the two of them to one entity. In a way the moving bodies are constantly looking for shared identity in order to create movement. It’s a constant giving and receiving of touch and weight, measuring decisions and listening to each other in order to maintain the point of ’tact‘. Goethe would probably say „Hier bin ich Mensch, hier darf ich’s sein!“ (transl. “Here am I a man, here may I be one“, J.W. von Goethe, rime 940/ Faust). It’s the acceptance of another body, of each other’s movement and spontaneous decisions. Contact Improvisation is a form where the phenomenon of the in between constantly happens on a physical aspect, literally in contact with another body.
The starting point of my final research arises from the fascination of moving bodies caught on the endless search of new pathways and possibilities with one another. At the same the matter of trust plays an important role. The question is how can I provoke, use and stretch out this trusting- relationship among dancers as a choreographer?
In order to identify a way to increase the level of physical trust among the dancers, I investigate practically in the studio. Within several sessions I explore this topic with a group of ten dancers and three musicians to create a final artistic product. 4th and 5th April one of the ArtEZ theatres will open the doors to show the results of the sessions, entirely under Goethe’s slogan: Here I am human, here I can be- here I can dance, here I can trust.
