Spontaneous Self
Awareness • Choice • Action • Embody
A pedagogical approach to dance improvisation performance.
The outcome of Spontaneous Self practice is to arrive at a state in which each artist can walk on stage, with a minimum of planning, and create a coherent, provocative and thoughtful performance.
Through the practice of specific exercises, structures, and scores, participating artists will be able to develop the following skills:
- create and perform an improvisational performance as an individual or member of a duet or small ensemble.
- develop a wider palette of movement and compositional choices for themselves within improvisational or choreographic performance works.
- construct frameworks to describe, teach and direct improvisational or choreographic works.
- establish an embodied practice which encompasses somatic, compositional, and conceptual understandings.
Spontaneous Self begins by differentiating the various elements of spontaneous action and creation - from inner to outer and individual and group - creating an extensive array of options for the performing artist. Then, through deep practice, these options are integrated into the palette of potentials which exist within the real time of improvisational practice. The end result is an intuitive performer who has an array of possibilities within the performative space, all of which arrive spontaneously in real time.
The Spontaneous Self curriculum is informed, influenced, and inspired by a wide range of artists and improvisational practices, including: KJ Holmes, Sharon Mansur, Nancy Stark Smith, Carol Swann, Jess Curtis, Contact Improvisation, Jerry Pearson, Chris Aiken, Integral Theory, Laban Movement Analysis, The Feldenkrais Method, Mindfulness Practices, and all the improvisational artists I’ve had the privilege of performing with over the last 30 years.