Semester Two - Week Seven

In this workshop we explored the telling of stories through different means. We were given a topic and then asked to portray this through movement and words. At first, it was hard to not do 'literal choreography' where you portray exactly what you are telling, this however is not truthful. The movements need to be an extension of the feelings and emotions of the words not just a physical representation of these words. This was quite hard to grasp, however, was a lot easier when we just used sounds or silence rather than words. Movement is sometimes devalued or hindered by the lexical or verbal language, and this workshop helped me to appreciate the beauty of movement and dance, as sometimes the physical language is more powerful and can say what the verbal language can only hint at. 

Using all the knowledge we have built up over the past year to do with the spine and body connectivity come into play here. As you cannot move without being aware of how each part of your body connects to one another and having support from each area do to move adventurous movements.   

Semester Two - Week Six

In this week's workshop we experimented with different parts of the body leading us, for example, one area of your body having eyes and how that would change your movements. 

We then started on preparations for the movement assessment. This involved a 'duet' piece focusing on contact improvisation. I found this quite difficult due to the injury I sustained in semester one. I find it hard to support my own weight onto my arm/elbow, so when you add someone else's weight on top of that, it was very painful and i wasn't able to support their weight. This therefore sometimes affected the fluidity of the piece as I would be more concerned with not sustaining pain or another injury. However, most of this was in my head and i am not probably going to injure myself. I find contact improvisation very uncomfortable to participate in. I am extremely self conscious about my weight and find it hard to trust someone with sharing my weight with someone. This therefore is a very hard task for me to come to terms with. 

Semester Two - Week Five

This workshop focused on the work we had done at the Hancock Museum, we had to physically explore the differences in movements in some animals, we looked at the differences in the spine in fish and apes. In this workshop we had physically take on the different spinal positions of these animals. This was quite tricky as the spine is fixed and not easily manipulated to imitate other animal's spines. We were given a list of different apes and asked to portray one of them, we chose a gorilla, then we had to become this animal, and the other groups had to guess who we were trying to show. We could tell what animals the groups were based on the position of the spines. This just goes to show how much our spine has on our movement. The spine is the 'backbone' of our body and therefore controls but also constricts some of our movements.

Hancock Museum

This week we went to the Hancock museum, this task was to explore the skeletons of different animals and compare them to our own. The most interesting part for me was the T-Rex, to see the difference in our structure and how this difference affects our ability to move in a certain way.

As you can see the T-Rex's structure is very different from our own, their ribs are much larger than ours, which means their organs must have been bigger or more spread out and more protected. Their skull is also a lot bigger which means its heavier and will affect their movement, as they wont be able to turn their head as quickly. We will be exploring these differences in movements in our next lesson.

Semester Two - Week Four

This week was extremely informative, we worked onthe joints of the body. The joints provide us with the majorioty of our movements. Althoug, the joints are where we hjold a lot of our tension and will therefore find it hard to move correctly and freely. To ensure we were relaxed we worked on massaging each other's main joints. I found working on the thigh joint relatively easy and i found it easy to give my weight and control of my leg to someone else. However, when it came to the shoulder and arms I found it extremely difficult to give the weight to someone else (it was the same person both times). Therefore, I discovered to the extent how much tension I carry in my shoulders, this was very enlightening. We worked on massaging for about 10 mins and for those 10 mins I did not manage to fully give the weight of my arm to scott (who was massaging me), this has made me feel slightly annoyed with myself as I couldn't fully get the benefit from this task and do what I was supposed to.

 

Relaxing, is something we do not do a lot of in today's society, the activities we call 'relaxing' like watching TV are not really relaxing our mind and body. This therefore, means we do not relieve the tension and stress and hold in it damaging ways in our body. I found that this exercise really helped me to appreciate the importance of relaxation, and I feel that in time I will be able to relax fully and this exercise will be extremely benefitical to me. After this class I went and researched the importance of relaxation and here are some links to various websites which I will use to help me relax and to find out the importance behind relaxing:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/emotional_health/mental_health/coping_relaxation.shtml
http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/stress-anxiety-depression/Pages/ways-relieve-stress.aspx
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~healthed/relax/index.html
http://www.rxadvices.com/relaxation-techniques/why-is-relaxation-important-what-are-the-benefits-of-relaxation/

Breath Made Visible

This week we had to watch a film about a dancer called Anna Halprin. This dance is very similar to the movements we do in our workshops. Anna does not focus on perfecting structured and rigid dance movements, but using dance to freely express our innermost thoughts. 

One bit that has stayed with me, was the part where Anna was teaching children a dance lesson and allowing them to express themselves. I found this extremely inspiring especially as I work with children and the beauty and innocence of a child is expressed through their seemingly random movements. I feel that Anna Halprin allows adults to express their 'inner child' in a way. 

Some parts though, I thought were slightly odd. When the dance group were dancing with brown paper. I am not entirely sure what was the point of that movement piece and what that means. But as I do not come from a dancer background I feel I may not be able to understand it fully as I would have done. One of my friends, who does come from a dancer background, really saw the beauty and understood the reasoning behind it. 

Semester Two - Week Three

This lesson really pushed me to the edge of comfort zone and I struggled with the strange abstractness of this workshop. 

We started by lying on our backs with our feet on the wall and our legs at a right angle, and had to yield and push ourselves off the wall with force. This I really struggled with, I could never get enough force to push myself that far away from the wall. Tom and Scott, who were next to me, managed to push themselves very far, i'm not entirely sure what they were doing differently to push themselves further or if it was just that they have more strength in their legs.

We then experimented with pulling and twisting people on the floor, this was quite fun although involved trust as you had to trust that the other person had your weight and that they weren't going to let you come to harm. I struggled with this at the beginning as I am very weary of injury after my previous injury. This means that it takes me a little longer to fully commit to giving my weight and trusting my safety with someone else. 

This next part of the workshop was the most odd which involved the yielding and pushing motion we used earlier. We had to yield and push off the floor and let our partner support us either from our ribs, hips or sit bones. This part was extremely odd and embarrassing to participate in. The relevance of the exercise to the performance degree is still something i'm questioning, although has allowed me to trust the peers in my class more.