CONTACT IMPROVISATION and the Energy Centers

Summer 2024 Contact Improvisation Class Series

Overview:

• Each week we will focus on one of the 7 major chakras as a lens through which we build solo and partnering skills that support contact improvisation.  Working from the ground up we expand our abilities to listen to ourselves and our partners so that the flow of life energy can move effortlessly through us as we improvise in contact.

• Each week we will incorporate attention to the breath as it supports connection to and movement from each of the energy centers.

• The following themes gleaned from the 7 major chakras will weave their way into both Foundational and Intermediate level classes.

  
  Weeks 1 & 2: Earth
  Creating and deepening a felt sense of connection and safety with the earth through yielding, grounding and rebounding. Refining one's ability to listen and respond though touch, continuously sensing the ground through own and partner's body and integrating feet and legs to pelvic floor and spine.
  
  Weeks 3 & 4: Water
  Connecting with the primary element in our bodies, water, to re-member our intrinsic flow. Accessing the power and fluidity of the pelvis and integrating it with rest of the body as co-create with partner. Developing the continuity of the rolling point of contact,  moving with embodied pleasure, navigating healthy boundaries, using momentum to create more ease in dancing and intentionally going off balance to create opportunities for the joy of falling and flying.

  
  Week 5: Fire
  Moving from own center (the source of life energy) and connecting to partner's, delighting in and deepening one's solo dance while dancing with space and partner(s) and exploring the organs of liver, stomach and kidneys as support for empowered dancing.
  
  Week 6 & 7: Air
  Expanding the awareness of the lungs and breath as well as the arms and hands and their relationship to the heart. Developing strategies for creating lightness in the body and allowing the spectrum of heart qualities to dance us.

  
  Week 8: Sound & Vibration
  Freeing up the neck, throat and jaw and allowing sound as a means to open self expression while we move. Integrating the head and torso though the pathway of the digestive tube and refining the ability to work with spherical space and inversions.
  
  Week 9: Light & Perception
  Using the physical eyes and imagination to give more depth in our perception, inviting the eyes to be the steering wheel for the spine, closing the eyes and opening to deeper levels of sensation and visualization so our inner world dances us.
  
  Week 10: Source
  Navigating the head as a limb to find ease in aligning vertically as well as moving through spherical space. Integrating all parts of the body, mind and spirit so that the life force flows freely. Letting go of ego control and letting in Universal guidance by opening up the crown of the head to deep listening to the unknown.  

• Week 11: Integration
  Integrating all the energy centers so we move from whole body awareness in ways that support efficient, easeful and varied movement expressions with ourselves and our partner(s).

   

  We practice these skills in an environment that honors our physical, emotional and mental boundaries...and invites their expansion.  In contact improvisation we discover the magic that happens as we play with our creative minds and hearts and the physics of two (or more) bodies in motion.

  MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE SUMMER 2024 CI CLASS SERIES