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The schedule is subject to changes.
ANJELIKA DONIY (RU)
Anjelika Doniy is a dance improviser, choreographer and teacher focused on contact.
After 5 years of formal studies of choreography, ballet dance and other stage disciplines at the Higher School of Culture (St-Petersburg), she worked for 10 Years as a theater choreographer. Until…
"In 1997, I was at the Impulse Dance Festival in Vienna. There, I saw a wonder of CI, watched Steve Paxton on stage, flew into Andrew Harwood workshop where some 70 dancers were rolling over each other. This was unbelievable, the earth was becoming alive. I saw a realization of my dream of the world growing from connection, interaction, harmony between one and many.
It was love from the first sight. From 2002 I started facilitating first jams and CI workshops in Russia and initiated International Contact Improvisation and Performance Festival in Moscow in 2006–2010.
My path in CI as a teacher began as long journey of workshops for beginners. I love to guide people into the dance, inspire them with their own body, and awaken to what is already there. I love to surprise long-time dancers with secrets of the body as little keys opening a familiar dance into new spaces. This year, I am following a program of the Institute for Integrative Bodywork and Movement Therapy to go deeper into the body and its anatomy, to touch the cells, to breathe through the navel, and to use this resource in my practice.
My special interest in contact improvisation is clarity. Clarity towards the practice. Honesty towards how I move my weight in the space of Gravity. Attention towards clearing the dance from the personal. Letting things happen as they go.
I am grateful to have met and studied with such teachers as Regine Chopinot, Steve Paxton, Nancy Stark Smith, Danny Lepkoff, Benno Voorham, Lisa Nelson, Esther Gal, Yaniv Mintzer, Martin Keo and many others."
Anjelica taught over 200 workshops all over the world for all levels from complete beginners to professional dancers. Her teaching is rooted in many years of work of acquiring and transmitting technical skills and equally long path of meditation and mindfulness practice. She blends them into a life dance, contact improvisation.
INTENSIVE: Elastic Attention
​For complete beginners
For beginners
For those who continue
To dance contact improvisation.
Anjelika tells:
I am inspired to run a CI workshop-lab, and will create the conditions:
- Material that grows from the basics and moves participants to jam safely, with a reliance on technique.
- Jam secrets that will blossom like seeds and support your jam experience in the evenings.
- CI labs. I will create structures and let in the lab spirit that will allow not only my experience as a facilitator to manifest but allow teachers and advanced participants to unfold the beauty of their dance path.
- A variety of transitions from beginning level to advanced and back again, so that we forget how small or big we are while remaining innocent, light and friendly in the dance.
What do you need to be ready for?
There will be a lot about efficiency and intuitive following of what is happening right now.
Work with the body in pairs, trios, in the form of bodywork.
Exercises with alternating roles of leading, following and releasing that lead into the dance.
There will be fairytale-like, imaginative invitations with precise, physically understandable instructions.
We will learn to move from the state of student training skills to losing these skills for the sake of poetry that does not require the sense of completeness.
Through all of which we will try to meet Contact Improvisation.
Exercises are important, but they cannot be more important than contact, flow, interaction of forces, inertia, that is already happening right now.
By practicing "Small Dance" we will learn to focus our attention on the inner space of the body.
We will meet with moving, rolling, sliding of the point of contact, when contact of two bodies gives importance to the search for mutual spatial trajectories.
The secrets of dance are revealed in space. Pauses, back space, entry into and exit from the dance, beginning and end, emptiness and fullness. We will learn to change states. And those states will be many.
Touching the source of movement.
Feeling compassion that is disarming.
Recognition of your fire.
Courage to accept yourself dancing.
Ability to adapt physical touch.
Gifts and losses as we surrender to the movement.
Expedition for the secret that is on the other side of the dance.
BASTIEN AUBER (FR)
Since 2011, he teaches Contact Improvisation in regular workshops, maserclasses and festivals in France and abroad (Germany, Spain, Italy, Israel, USA, Russia, Ukraine, India).
He trained in dance by traveling and working with many teachers of CI, instant composition and somatic techniques. Since few years, teaching CI is his main job.
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His approach to body dynamics is linked with the existing movements in nature (microcosm and macrocosm) and with the 5 elements.. spirals, and more.
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He is also a dance performer, a geologist, and a geo-biologist.
He practices meditation, contemplative dance, Authentic Movement, and he attaches a great importance to the poetry and the invisible in the dance.
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WEBSITE : http://bastien-auber.jimdo.com/
YOUTUBE : https://www.youtube.com/@BastienAUBER
INSTAGRAM : @bastienauber
BALANCING CENTERS : CI Fundamentals Workshop
In contact improvisation, the concept of "CENTER" is often mentioned.
For me, a center speaks of a notion of balance and creates a periphery, often associated with a sphere.
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We will use this term to develop a common vocabulary in our contact improvisation practice.
We will play at bringing together and balancing different centers:
​center of mass / anatomical center / center of perception ;
… and also the centers of the earth and the universe !!
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It is through games of balance of bodies, through encounters with others, that we will address technical and fundamental aspects of CI:
​foot positions, pelvic mobility, spinal axes, eyes support, and the precision of a lift.
MANUELA BLANCHARD (CH)
Dancer, WaterDance® teacher, Watsu® practitioner with a large experience in Healing Dance®, Manuela Blanchard has been teaching Contact & Dance Improvisation in Switzerland since 20 years. CI in water grew out of her wish to combine the interactive intelligence of contact improv with some techniques of aquatic bodywork. She was one of the first to share in international festivals (f.ex. Thai Water-Land that she co-grounded).
In 2017 she created "Aquatic Bodywaves", involving dance improvisation as a way to learn aquatic bodywork more playfully and intuitively than the classic water trainings. Her work links intimately emotional process and tantric tools to aquatic research.
Fascinated by fluidity, whether in human relationships or in body language, she likes to combine improvised dance with a search for a connection to one’s deepest nature. Her teaching supports everyone in their own discovery of vitality, authenticity, openness and presence.
Her enthusiasm for organic and expressive qualities of movement led her to explore Butoh, Authentic Movement, Body Mind Centering, Synchronized Swimming (intensively as a teenager) and Tango among many other artistic fields. She is also Esalen Massage practitioner with experience in emotion coaching process.
WATER INTENSIVE
In this workshop you learn how to play with the resistance and dynamic of water, how to ground your feet and anchor your movements in order to make soft and clear propositions with a soft quality of touch. You transition between standing, catching the waves with your whole body, falling into motion and graceful flow.
You let the physical forces such as friction, buoyancy or inertia lead you into the unknown. As no one decides where to go, you engage deeply in a non verbal communication, where you listen to which dance wants to grow at the present moment.
In the subaquatic explorations, you are invited to relax and expand your breathing and experience an expansion of your consciousness. We will reach for inner stillness to reach a state, where we can bring our body and mind to explore freely in the water.
KATYA PODOPRIGORA (KATE RIORA) (RU/HU)
Dancer, performer, coach, bodywork therapist.
I am dancing most of my life on land, in the air, in the water and on the ice. I am in love with Contact Improvisation for 18 years now, and have studied many bodywork and improvisation techniques. I am a water therapist and for many years practicing spontaneous massage.
I have studied various somatics approaches, including Body Mind Centering, Somatic Experiencing, Skinner Release Therapy. Currently I live, work and dance between Budapest, Moscow Corfu and Thailand
LAB: Authentic Movement
The Authentic Movement lab will be about a unique possibility to contact our nature without looking for something specific or having a purpose. We will work solo/ or in pairs where one person (a mover) will be given plenty of time with closed eyes to dive into their inner world and present moment at the same time, and from this state perhaps something will appear: impulses to move, desire to explore, dance or simply to rest The other person will give their focused attention to support the mover and witness whatever may arise in the moment. This lab will be a unique possibility to come back to the roots of own existence and to explore in a safe way different aspects of self in connection with the environment.
Hands-on Bodywork: Awareness and Release
This short class will be about bringing awareness into our bodies. Through conscious breathing and touch we will be looking for possibilities to notice and release unnecessary tensions. We will learn to differentiate various types of touch and bring to life different body parts Through gentle work with a partner or in trio we will record into our systems new patterns of body awareness: skin, muscles and bone structures. You do not need to have any experience of body work or massage.
WATER INTENSIVE: Dancing with Water and Others
This workshop will be about exploring the physical and emotional aspects of our bodies in contact with water and with each other. We will be looking for possibilities to move our bodies in the warm water through the light movements, releasing and floating. We will observe how our bodies get tense without any reason and learn how to notice and release unnecessary tensions and body patterns. Through gentle work with a partner or in trios we will record into our systems new patterns of movement in the water, hopefully leading to free dance and joy. You do not need to have any experience of body work or massage. Come with open eyes and hearts.
ELISABETH ANDRIO (GR/DE)
Eli started her embodiment journey through yoga. In India she first discovered contact improvisation dance. She has been travelling the world exploring various movement and bodywork modalities as well as meditative practices. Her interest lies in the greater body mind realm, the potential for healing and living to our fullest.
Water is the element she feels most at home. She works as a water therapist and recently started the flying.pool.project on Corfu, a therapy pool dedicated to the aquatic arts. She is an avid water dancer that loves to let her dance be informed by the landscape, deep water dancing, shallow, in the sea, waterfalls, rivers, in the pool. She feels that part of her mission is to connect people to the magic of the water.
WATER INTENSIVE
In our pool water dancing sessions we will a journey into embryonic states. The warm and calm waters, a womb like environment are conducive to deep relaxation. We will explore movement that arises naturally and authentically. The intention is to move from a state of doing towards resting in the joy of beingness. In each session the will be invitations for various scores. No previous experience needed, come as you are, all of you is welcomed!
BEACH LAB: Amphibian Adventures
In our beach and sea session we will explore our amphibian nature. Savouring the warmth of the sand, the solidity of the ground, the movement of the sea. We will play with solo movement as well as with partners. Experiment with your CI vocabulary with changing degrees of gravity! No previous experience needed, bring your curiosity!
ZUZANNA BUKOWSKI (DE/PL)
Zuzanna Bukowski started dancing at the age of 4 and continued her embodiment practices through martial arts, ballet, yoga, modern dance, and Axis Syllabus. She has been deepening her embodiment practice under the influence of various international contact improvisation and contemporary dance teachers.
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Currently, she is deeply interested in applying movement principles highlighted by the Axis Syllabus into the practice of contact improvisation, as well as the Underscore structure. She is passionate about the impact of connection between body and mind, which she continues to discover through her work in coaching, IT, and dance.
Teaching dance, co-organizing the Thailand Contact & Movement Arts Festival, Warsaw CI Flow Festival and working as an IT Consultant gives her the balance between headspace and movement art.
WORKSHOP: Moving Me , Moving You – Solo into CI
In this workshop we will dive into the world of researching our own movement patterns and breaking those, before we get into contact with one another. We will focus on different CI principles using the lens of the Axis Syllabus to refine our movements and create more potentiality in our moving structures. Exploring those alone, in specific patterns and partner work shall deepen the understanding of the concepts.
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We will dive deeper into the concepts of landing pads, tensegrity and how our bones are moving in the body. Asking questions like: How can meeting the floor be a soft experience? How can biodynamics make our moves smooth and strong at the same time? And how can we keep our own flow while moving with someone else? We will jump, roll, research, soften, listen to good music and have fun with great music. We’ll also incorporate choreographic patterns to smoothly transition into solo movement, ensuring a mix of learning and fun throughout the workshop.
IDO MARON (IL)
Ido is a longtime movement enthusiast, exploring movement via Capoeira, Tai-chi, classic dance, contemporary dance and even folk dancing. He has been performing in various kinds of dance-theater creations - from Operas to children’s fairy tales brought on stage, contemporary, commercial, and more.
Today he is mostly fascinated about the influence that emotional patterns have on movement patterns and vice versa.
Ido has been teaching contact improvisation since 2021, focusing on the different ways in which increasing a dancer’s physical awareness of their own body can generate a richer and a more comprehensive understanding of the connection between them and their partner/s.
Contact Improvisation Class
class description coming soon
Valentyn Korotkevych (@valevych) is a Ukrainian-Canadian somatic therapy practitioner, spoken word and movement artist. His work integrates Polyvagal theory, Deep Tissue Massage, and poetry of being an active body-mind- connected system. As a masseuse & dancer, he has facilitated & provided his services across Europe and Asia.
His approach to CI (Contact Improvisation) lies in the root of introspection, contemplation & fundamental feeling of honesty, inclusivity & mutual care.
Valentyn studied, lived & pursued the cinematic art media in Canada for 7+ years, creating & receiving recognition for his subtle independent films while discovering his identity in the medium of combined art-movement-therapy-poetry in motion of life & modern pursuit for balanced being.
As a dancer, he was lucky to pursue the consistent dream of deciphering the form of movement & somatics of body-mind through retreats, classes, events & workshops across Finland, Austria, Moldova, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Turkey, Thailand, S Korea, Honk Kong, Macao, China (Guangzhou), Vietnam & Japan.
CONTACT IMPROVISATION CLASS
description coming soon
TUO MAA (FIN)
TUO MAA is musician, multi-instrumentalist, resident DJ of Corfu Ecstatic Dance and sound engineer, soundgardian of Soundgarden.
He is originally from Finland. Traveling several years around the world, discovering different communities, cultures, traditions, experiencing sounds and vibrations, he is now settled down to Arillas, Corfu. Through travels and changes, music has been within all the waves of life, through flows of unknown.
Non verbal communication fashioned to discover more different ways to communicate. Improvisation in different ways, through music and movement, he found Ecstatic Dance, Contact Improvisation, Circus, Flow and Martial arts. He has been playing Live Ecstatic Dance sets, creating music for fire performances, Contact Impro jamming’s and hosting several Jamming’s. He trust in his music for the magic of improvisation, power of the moment and unknown, that it brings us to the right place when we surrender and trust.
TUO MAA mix different instruments and elements in his music. He sings, play guitar, clarinet, flutes, handpan and blend it together with live looping, drum machine and synth. He also use recordings from the nature to bring elements of the nature in to his sets. In Contact Improvisation jamming he tune in to the energy and vibration of the group and interact, improvising music through the feeling of the space and people, bringing waves and different qualities of the movement to the dancefloor.