Thania
is a professional
choreographer, dance movement psychotherapist and lecturer currently completing a PhD at Aberdeen University, Scotland and teaching at the MSc in Dance Movement Psychotherapy at Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh. She comes to Kinitiras Choreography Lab with a grant from Creative Scotland (Scottish Arts Council) for professional development.
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My choreographic interest this year is two-fold. The first
involves artistic inquiry regarding the therapeutic performance –
which I am writing a book chapter on. The concept centres on what
happens to the therapeutic process when your material is put up for
others to see, and the influences between actual and perceived
notions of audience, witness and its impact on choosing and editing
material to be performed. I am also focussing on the internal process
of seeing and being seen and how personal material is shaped using
movement vocabulary.
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The
second aspect is a study on entanglement, on how people seep
through the cracks in us; penetrate without even passing through our
consciousness. This work will encompass site-specific filming and
live performance, and the parallel of infiltration and penetration as
presented in nature with the juxtaposition of bodies in, around, and
through space. This project is being developed as part of two
residencies in Scotland, and another section is being developed in
Barcelona. The piece will also capture explorations on negative space
(space in-between), proximity and intimacy, with their potential to
overpower, stifle or comfort each other.
My
choreographic interest is between movement and meaning, interlacing
concepts from movement analysis, dance movement psychotherapy, and
performance, interlacing bridges between disciplines and creating a
focus on the process of expression.
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30 July 2012
Clarity
To be able to see entrances and exits, to feel the beginning and the end of things.
To pin point a spot in the space, to make a decision with eye, skin, part or whole.
Clarity organizes, intention crystallizes, yet we often ponder in the middle, hesitating
In movement, clarity can be in space, in gaze, with yourself, with the other.
Yet, lets not forget that clarity needs to be translated by the other -
There is a mutuality whether momentary, synchronous or sustained, that needs to be achieved, for two beings to decide nonverbally or verbally, that something is clear.
How that decision, compromise, debate or disagreement occurs, is completely open to suggestions.
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30 July 2012
Clarity
To be able to see entrances and exits, to feel the beginning and the end of things.
To pin point a spot in the space, to make a decision with eye, skin, part or whole.
Clarity organizes, intention crystallizes, yet we often ponder in the middle, hesitating
In movement, clarity can be in space, in gaze, with yourself, with the other.
Yet, lets not forget that clarity needs to be translated by the other -
There is a mutuality whether momentary, synchronous or sustained, that needs to be achieved, for two beings to decide nonverbally or verbally, that something is clear.
How that decision, compromise, debate or disagreement occurs, is completely open to suggestions.
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31 July - 4 August 2012
Robert gives us a task to dance out, for his research, happiness. After showing our phrases, we discuss and he uses the information from each explanation to layer on the following task -In my case: Use the beginning of my phrase and add on a text layer: stating: I should. I should be happy. Robert interjects with redirections while Im moving/talking while I execute a phrase which embodies - I should - I should be happy. After watching it on video, I realize that throughout the phrase, even though my words changed, the movement felt trapped, cyclical - it could not progress. Seems like a point of reflection - when you are trying to be happy, trying to move on, trying to hold on to things, if it is really not genuine, if you Should instead of Are, then, are you trapped? Are you compulsively trying to break out but still persist on the pattern?
I reflect upon the parallels between therapeutic and artistic process here. The therapeutic framework is essentially to draw out from the information the patient/client gives you - nonverbal and verbal - from the body posture to any words uttered. It was a great way for me to see how someone who doesn't come from dance movement psychotherapy, like Robert was able to use this framework for a creative process. His way of listening to others is something dance movement psychotherapists train on, work at, work through, yet it can still be applicable in a non-therapeutic context, and furthermore in an artistic one. Yet another vantage point of movement-based self-knowledge and its applicability to a variety of contexts.
-----------
What a week of growth - confrontation with our own truths, with our own conflicts. Mine is linked directly with my research. The performance - the "entertain on command". This week we were asked to improvise, to be vulnerable, to trust each other - on command. Because I said so. Because you need to. Because you are a dancer. Because you should. But trust is not something you can turn on command. Its not something you give or you take; you earn, you develop, you grow trust. In movement it is basically the same thing. This is how, as dancers, we begin to lie with our bodies. Someone says: Condition A, B, C. Go!! And we learn to fix our bodies in a way which can replicate feeling, portray and convince, despite what we are feeling in the moment.
The debate then commences between what we consider genuine, vulnerable, true, and what is fabricated, fake or manipulated, plus all the grays in between. As a dance movement therapist, we get trained to perceive when inner connectivity in the body exists in the other, and to empathize with the other's body. This has begun to challenge the way I view performance. At times, I feel like my body is a lie detector - I can feel in my own body when someone I am watching or moving with is disconnected to their own present sense while moving. It is something that resonates with me, and sometimes is difficult to explain. I guess, the word of the day is "embodiment". When there is inner connectivity, as Peggy Hackney calls it, there is an internal congruence in movement and being. The moving self and the feeling self, the thinking self and the social self communicate and create synchronous moments. This is why we cannot feel on command, or trust on command - this is how the lying dancer is created. A wedge is sometimes created between the doing and sensing. It becomes a necessary tool, the acting (nonverbally and verbally), the pretending - but I think when it becomes the way we dance all the time, it is dangerous.
I was faced with this challenge this week during one of the workshops. Lie to me. The statement was embedded in the task (as I perceive it). Lie to me: that you want to do this, that you want me to see you, that you want to be the center of attention. Improvise and take it to the theatrical, take your body to its limits, make it faster, make it more interesting, make it to my aesthetic and movement priorities - but be genuine, be original. be yourself. And that is exactly what I did - which I came off as satirical, and a double dimension - I am performing about not wanting to perform for you. And trying it out so that it also fulfills my research objective. The dancer in me says - I SHOULD follow the instructions - fights with the fact that sometimes, in choreographic and artistic processes, questioning a task is equally useful to take oneself to another place. I realize that I am a different kind of dancer now. And I realize that as a teacher, or a therapist it is an incredible strength to listen to process, to the bodies, to the social dynamics in a place - to take every piece of the system in consideration, while maintaining the body as a focus. Again, as I wrote in the previous section - therapeutic processes and structures are also very useful in artistic processes. And vice-versa. This nurtures the chapter I need to write at the end of this month. There are many aspects of the four professions I navigate that need to start talking to each other. It is a tiring process when observed from the outside however.
This also fueled the creative process I am presenting tomorrow. A recapitulation of every moment throughout this very confrontational, yet enriching process. I am taking a step beyond my comfort zone - going into improvisational structures that encapsulate very poignant moments of lying - with body, with manipulation, with academic jargon, with day to day language. I reflected on the statements surrounding this theme, and deriving from the experiences at the lab and my own perceptions, I write out sentences that become improvisational tasks. I put the tasks out to the audience, so they have control over them, the time is taken by Marielys, who gives a minute to each task, and Kiriakos has a set of randomized soundtracks to play. The audience decides what I do. I will, as asked earlier this week, entertain - on command. I comment on the fact that I SHOULD perform. I should entertain. I should try to lie through every task, by being honest with myself about what it should be. An endless loop, Catch 22 style. I use the word Should a lot, even when giving directions to the audience, since it came up in Robert's workshop - I should do this, I should do that. Lots of shoulds in the dance world. Oh dear.
Excited, however, for tomorrow - really relaxing - to not have to rehearse steps - except a phrase I have been working on throughout the two weeks, which will be shown when someone in the audience calls Hola (hello in Spanish, and it also means "everything" in Greek - although maybe with a different spelling). It will be a great exercise in being in the moment - the most basic therapeutic tool in DMT. Will post how it goes.
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Closing Remarks
When you let go, you gain. I guess that is my biggest reflection on the Lab. The performance was a success - the audience laughed, made faces, felt uncomfortable, so in some ways, there was an impact. I loved the fact that some of them got very involved, and others froze on their tracks. From the pic above you can see the range of reactions. There were definitely some fantastic moments, that hopefully are preserved in the video. I had fun - which is sometimes difficult to say within a performance that has so many if-then factors. I was able to just be in the moment. My favourite concept, however, speaking as a dance movement therapist of course, was the group cohesion and the comraderie that developed out of all of this. Everyone felt part of it. I was asked to do a warm-up for the group, and I felt us all come together, from different backgrounds, in different stages, and in those last days emerged a connection that only stress, performance and dance can put together. The song for my piece became an anthem - Bla Bla Bla, and the phrase "communal peach" - referring to the sharing of the peaches that are absolutely divine in this country became a symbol of community. For me that is what is important. I wish it would have come together sooner, but somehow, it flows how it needs to be. Many new adventures to come - and perhaps this is a hatching egg for a new project in 2013... Who knows? I could just be saying bla bla bla.
Thank you to the communal peach. It was definitely a journey....
31 July - 4 August 2012
Robert gives us a task to dance out, for his research, happiness. After showing our phrases, we discuss and he uses the information from each explanation to layer on the following task -In my case: Use the beginning of my phrase and add on a text layer: stating: I should. I should be happy. Robert interjects with redirections while Im moving/talking while I execute a phrase which embodies - I should - I should be happy. After watching it on video, I realize that throughout the phrase, even though my words changed, the movement felt trapped, cyclical - it could not progress. Seems like a point of reflection - when you are trying to be happy, trying to move on, trying to hold on to things, if it is really not genuine, if you Should instead of Are, then, are you trapped? Are you compulsively trying to break out but still persist on the pattern?
I reflect upon the parallels between therapeutic and artistic process here. The therapeutic framework is essentially to draw out from the information the patient/client gives you - nonverbal and verbal - from the body posture to any words uttered. It was a great way for me to see how someone who doesn't come from dance movement psychotherapy, like Robert was able to use this framework for a creative process. His way of listening to others is something dance movement psychotherapists train on, work at, work through, yet it can still be applicable in a non-therapeutic context, and furthermore in an artistic one. Yet another vantage point of movement-based self-knowledge and its applicability to a variety of contexts.
-----------
What a week of growth - confrontation with our own truths, with our own conflicts. Mine is linked directly with my research. The performance - the "entertain on command". This week we were asked to improvise, to be vulnerable, to trust each other - on command. Because I said so. Because you need to. Because you are a dancer. Because you should. But trust is not something you can turn on command. Its not something you give or you take; you earn, you develop, you grow trust. In movement it is basically the same thing. This is how, as dancers, we begin to lie with our bodies. Someone says: Condition A, B, C. Go!! And we learn to fix our bodies in a way which can replicate feeling, portray and convince, despite what we are feeling in the moment.
The debate then commences between what we consider genuine, vulnerable, true, and what is fabricated, fake or manipulated, plus all the grays in between. As a dance movement therapist, we get trained to perceive when inner connectivity in the body exists in the other, and to empathize with the other's body. This has begun to challenge the way I view performance. At times, I feel like my body is a lie detector - I can feel in my own body when someone I am watching or moving with is disconnected to their own present sense while moving. It is something that resonates with me, and sometimes is difficult to explain. I guess, the word of the day is "embodiment". When there is inner connectivity, as Peggy Hackney calls it, there is an internal congruence in movement and being. The moving self and the feeling self, the thinking self and the social self communicate and create synchronous moments. This is why we cannot feel on command, or trust on command - this is how the lying dancer is created. A wedge is sometimes created between the doing and sensing. It becomes a necessary tool, the acting (nonverbally and verbally), the pretending - but I think when it becomes the way we dance all the time, it is dangerous.
I was faced with this challenge this week during one of the workshops. Lie to me. The statement was embedded in the task (as I perceive it). Lie to me: that you want to do this, that you want me to see you, that you want to be the center of attention. Improvise and take it to the theatrical, take your body to its limits, make it faster, make it more interesting, make it to my aesthetic and movement priorities - but be genuine, be original. be yourself. And that is exactly what I did - which I came off as satirical, and a double dimension - I am performing about not wanting to perform for you. And trying it out so that it also fulfills my research objective. The dancer in me says - I SHOULD follow the instructions - fights with the fact that sometimes, in choreographic and artistic processes, questioning a task is equally useful to take oneself to another place. I realize that I am a different kind of dancer now. And I realize that as a teacher, or a therapist it is an incredible strength to listen to process, to the bodies, to the social dynamics in a place - to take every piece of the system in consideration, while maintaining the body as a focus. Again, as I wrote in the previous section - therapeutic processes and structures are also very useful in artistic processes. And vice-versa. This nurtures the chapter I need to write at the end of this month. There are many aspects of the four professions I navigate that need to start talking to each other. It is a tiring process when observed from the outside however.
This also fueled the creative process I am presenting tomorrow. A recapitulation of every moment throughout this very confrontational, yet enriching process. I am taking a step beyond my comfort zone - going into improvisational structures that encapsulate very poignant moments of lying - with body, with manipulation, with academic jargon, with day to day language. I reflected on the statements surrounding this theme, and deriving from the experiences at the lab and my own perceptions, I write out sentences that become improvisational tasks. I put the tasks out to the audience, so they have control over them, the time is taken by Marielys, who gives a minute to each task, and Kiriakos has a set of randomized soundtracks to play. The audience decides what I do. I will, as asked earlier this week, entertain - on command. I comment on the fact that I SHOULD perform. I should entertain. I should try to lie through every task, by being honest with myself about what it should be. An endless loop, Catch 22 style. I use the word Should a lot, even when giving directions to the audience, since it came up in Robert's workshop - I should do this, I should do that. Lots of shoulds in the dance world. Oh dear.
Excited, however, for tomorrow - really relaxing - to not have to rehearse steps - except a phrase I have been working on throughout the two weeks, which will be shown when someone in the audience calls Hola (hello in Spanish, and it also means "everything" in Greek - although maybe with a different spelling). It will be a great exercise in being in the moment - the most basic therapeutic tool in DMT. Will post how it goes.
--------------
Closing Remarks
Thank you to the communal peach. It was definitely a journey....
