NC Gamboa 2015
Forces United - Physics and energy management during movement
with Baris
The laws of physics are immutable. We can struggle against or collaborate with them, squander the power they give us or turn it to our advantage. We can change the way we behave, but we cannot change them. Centripetal, centrifugal and radial force, terms that describe these principles, by which our universe moves, and the laws we must observe as we move through it. How can we change direction without canceling the kinetic energy we have created while moving? How do we channel this energy for challenging tricks and high jumps? In this class, we will construct dances that will outline and explore these and other questions.
Transformers - advanced chronological architecture
with Baris
Current science suggests that our physical structure is the progressive outcome of adapting to environmental challenges over millions of years. This adaptation process has spurred the development of a remarkable legacy of potential responses: whirling, bending, spiraling, accelerating, twisting and compensating. Movement education has played an obvious and critical role in refining these capacities to graceful expression, transforming our obstacles and challenges to playful opportunities for creative endeavor. In this session, aspiring to contribute to this evolutionary mandate, we will apply AS protocol for level changes, spinal mechanics and alignment fundamentals for greater skill and freedom.
WEEK I
Shake It Dont Break It...
teacher: Frey Faust
Jiggle, wiggle, waggle, wobble... gentle oscillation fluidifies and releases, warms and mobilizes. In this class we will de and recompose undulations for a deeper understanding of what is doing what when and where its all going, while we treat ourselves the way mamma would want.
WEEK II
Fear No Sphere
teacher: Frey Faust
Context is all. Different postures determine how and which muscle chains will fire, and how the spine will behave. An essential research field of the AS, the mapping of the SPHERES, or the various postural relationships to support, give us a powerful lens to examine these contexts.
WEEK III
Vectors Matter
teacher: Frey Faust
Why consider directions carefully? Different directions bring us into distinctly different situations. Some of those situations might or might not be desired. The appraisal of our surroundings and the ability to predict the outcome of a directional choice is one of the most basic ways to create a respectful social ambience, and claim physical autonomy.
In this class we will use the AS vector system to study outcomes (forces), and practice directional precision and accuracy.
WEEK IV
Contact Improvisation, or
The Evolution of Empathy / Self?Other?
Teacher: Frey Faust
Empathy seems to be a rare yet precious attribute in Nature. The social phenomenon of learning/teaching is most certainly an important application of empathy, or at least could provide an influential context for enhancing and examining it. Since learning and teaching are activities which rely on perception, and perception is the first building material from empathy, perception will be the primary focus of this workshop. Besides continuing to transmit the tools provided by the AS codex, I will also work from aspects of Sandro Beltramo's drawing methodology, translated for 3-D space and the moving body, using the idea and act of line creation and line quality to hone our vision, situation interpretation and partnering skills.
Environmental Frequencies
Gathered together for the Nomadic College we all bring our stories, that shape the bodies and the way how we interact with the environment - physical,aural, cultural, social, political.
During the week we will look at the tools offered by the Axis Syllabus and especially at the basic universal act of walking to explore our internal and external dialogues and adaptations
We will share impressions and intuitions about the meaning of keeping the sense of ourselves and at the same time negotiating a way of sharing the space and time with others – the body will be our guide.
There will be theoretical and practical input, discussion, games, and some dancing together.
WEEK II
The polyrhythmic body
Live Music and live electronic: Lorenzo Gasperoni
Francesca and Lorenzo have worked together for more than ten years. They share a curiosity for the cross-contamination of culture, art, style and perspective. Their research is inspired by the relationship between polyrhythms and the dancing body in the cultures of West Africa and the Diaspora. In these traditions, dance and music are inextricably linked, in continuous dialogue. Mirroring each other they come together in a single language that is in continuous metamorphosis.
The polyrhythmic body springs from the desire to merge the inherent wisdom of tradition and the latest studies in somatic practice and biomechanics with the modern techniques of electronic music, in the belief that ancient and current performative practices can communicate with and enrich each other.
In our workshops we aspire to facilitate a profound intimacy between live music and the moving body, and suggest ways in which both can assist in the gathering of skill and awareness, as well as engender and enhance creative expression.
Perceiving, sensing, knowing:
towards an ecological approach to the performing body. Lucia Palladino
The departure point of our research will be the sufficiency of our performing bodies, when they are balancing million frequencies and relationship they belong to. The body always retains a certain degree of shadow, which dwells together with the flashing lashes of light it is caught by and glitter with.
The reference point is always the anatomy of the body, the internal organs, the muscles, the bones. The performer is a surgeon conducting from an inner perspective. And this is our first perspective of our body: it unfolds and unveils through an everchanging in-and-out investigation. The surgeon penetrates the body with his scalpel. The dimension we reach is a carnal one, which transcends the flesh itself, the viscera. Just like the sex act. From the inner inwards, to dig up and find structures repeating in a fractal manner, with the minuscule magnifying itself more and more and beyond.
This method will allow us to “find out” that the deepest part of the system is the same as its surface, that is to say «inner life is simple/skeleton, faeces and philosophy».1 The structural geometry, the architecture of the relationships linking the outside with the inside, the inner with the bottom, the dark with ghosts and the matter with the mind, features a fully
multidimensional system. It is no single-direction structure, like Newton’s ones, which are ruled by the force of gravity and feature a linear direction from top downwards and from bottom upwards. We are talking about unpredictable, round, self-sufficient, flexible and resilient structures, which allow the empty space, the shadow, the invisible to become fundamental and integral parts of the structure itself.
2These structures represent nothing but themselves. Complex structures. They are the bodies art exploits to reveal the unknown, the unpredictable and the sacred. Bodies as the result of an intricate fabric of relationships, which make up oneness from a multitude.
FAST FORWARD - speedy coordination
Moving fast was always fascinating to me. The question for me always was how to keep the sensitivity for the inner processes and mechanics and make the jump from slow and internally oriented to fast and dynamic coordinations. What does moving fast require? What mechancs do i need to adapt and change so i can realize the switch to fast movement. Which skills of awarenesses need to be developed in order to prepare for a more conscious and maybe safe transition to dynamic motion? These and other attempts will be content of this workshop.
WEEK IV
IRRESISTABLE - the seductive spine
The idea for this workshop came when I realised that my study of the spine always needed to be reviewed whenever I found a new component relevant for human locomotion. Irresistably everything reconnected through the spine. The spine symbolises for me a branching outreach of the brain through our body connecting main body segments, containing important genetic information and taking the central role in movement. We will go back and re-examine the spine through various filters in action.
Mission Alignment/baris
A review on alignment for dynamic situations
Alignment Ausrichtung Hizalama אַליינמאַנט Alineació
Alignement ευθυγραμμία Выравнивание,
Alignment; a word that describes the amazing process of communication that happens between the bones and myofascia, allowing the body to embrace, channel and whirl within the field of physical forces without injury. I perceive alignment as the guiding intelligence within every living organism. It provides chain-reaction information relays, that pass messages to and from every region of the body. It counsels, reports, protects and at the same time, expands the limits of what is possible.
For me, the starting point for this research lies in the deep layers of our structure, a meeting between sensation and understanding. Discover, deepen or practice listening and responding to this deep dialogue, as we investigate states of alignment for various dynamic situations: floor work, turns and jumps, ramps and landings.
PHASE 2 August 29 - September 2
ADD-ON CLASS! 9.30 - 11.30 max 15 participants
In-Side-Bending
internal spinal mechanics
Lateral flexion describes a property of the spine which is inherited throughout our evolution in order to offer pathways for moving forward. It seems that any direction chosen for movement includes lateral shifts which derive through a reactive and continuous change of weight and support. In order to develop more optimal solutions we will analyse how the lateral properties interfere and collaborate with multiple other directions. This collaborative phenomenon intermingles multiple directions in order to optimise the energetic investment for chosen pathways and offers a context related organisation of the spine.
Brace for Landing
tools for jumps without bumps
The brace-brace position from airplane safety protocols always seemed suspiciously ignorant to me. Flexing the spine sagitally towards potentially disastrous incoming forces places... equals maximum risk of injury! A decided lack of knowledge or empathy for human anatomy. In this session we will explore postures and co-ordinations that coil and uncoil in ways that can help us absorb more shock, rebound or catapult us back up into the air. We will eventually combine this study with swinging and thrusting, to assist us in creating and directing kinetic energy, while reducing load and strain on our joints. Through the practice of functional, efficient movement patterns and postures, we can hopefully discover other, more suitable brace-brace positions, to be better prepared for the unexpected, and ultimately enjoy the moments of no-or-low gravity and landing.