Beyond Skin

Bennington College spring 2022
from the performance: "Beyond Skin"
taken by Lindsey Miller

One way to use dance as a life practice, is to reframe it as a an opportunity for sensing presence/life force in the body while letting go of all self judgment. This allows for spontaneity and appreciation to be at the heart of movement. And all life is movement.

Men in Motion

Photo by Theresia Kaufmann
Dancing with my long time friend Matan. We share a deep love for movement as a pathway of sanity, play, and life research. I am proud to have him as a close friend who is unafraid to move fully in this life. I am intrigued by the topic of dancing men. When and how do men dance? What are the avenues available or encouraged for men to be embodied and connected to heart, bones, and brain?
In ancient mythology Ares, the Greek god of war was also the god of dance. A relationship was established between the physical and emotional body to work in harmony while allowing instinct to be expressed. It is known that in tribal cultures, warriors are dancers, and before battles, they dance with drums and music to encourage good luck in the fight to come. The mythology was pointing to a Man's integration with his own inner feminine, as a path toward integration and maturity. In western modern day culture, outside of professional sports and martial arts there is not much room for these qualities to be harnessed and channeled creatively. I hope for movement and dance to continue to evolve and be widely available and encouraged as avenues which encourage body awareness, athleticism, authenticity, self authority, and creativity in life. I wish for more men to be brave in Dance.

Being Seen

I have always been in awe at the transformation we go through when we allow ourselves to be seen in our dance. It is almost like we are given a glimpse of our naked, pre verbal self, and the dance proves the permission to just hang out in that space of awe. This was a group moment after a weeklong intensive of exploring this concept of being seen through playful intentional scores with dance and CI.

On the Power of Playfulness

The power of play allows us to loosen all the tightness around our perceived identity and holdings-on to the serious opinions and view points which turn us all into somewhat rigid adults. Being taken seriously has it's place in society, and we should hold our esteem high while with the same breath remember to exhale into some silliness. The moment is here. Then it is gone. Stay with it. Breathe. Inevitably, we all slip into the trap of seriousness. Relax. Smile. Be Silly. Play.

Thoughts on CI

Contact Improvisation as a research approach has provided me a platform to experience similar exhilarating "flow states" I had previously found in sports. It allowed me to embody an activity that encapsulates all of my favorite qualities inherent in a practice which elevates my sense of connected aliveness; presence, instinct, intuition, breath, listening, allowing, inviting, playfully resisting- all of these show up in the dance through an intelligence that can be at times felt as a pre-verbal skill which was lost and is now being rediscovered.