WORKSHOP with Raffaella Galdi -  CONTEMPORARY DANCE

My teaching offers a research laboratory and it is proposed in 3 phases:

- training the body / working with the body

- exploration

- composition

training the body / working with the body

The training allows the body to become open, receptive and prepared for moving and also functions as a groundwork for the movement investigation which has a very specific focus.

I guide with my voice and physical demonstration through a sequence of exercises, using the floor and standing levels, starting very slowly and increasing the speed through out the process. We bring attention and awareness to:

The bone structure, its natural alignment and articulations

The release-alignment is a way of working more efficiently by using less muscle tension (only using deep muscles and strictly the amount of tension required to move and dance) and of aligning the bone structure (to respect its natural condition and to use the connection with gravity).

The purpose is not to work towards “exercising” the muscles, but rather to “wake them up”; to use them for support and realignment of the bones. The aim is to align the bones and to become connected - “release and connection”.

The relationship of our body to gravity

By aligning the bone structure, respecting its natural condition, we can use the connection with “gravity”, which is natural and always present. In fact, gravity acts in our body provoking a sense of “weight shift” inside the body and from the body into space. This sense of inner relocation of body weight produces movement.

To be in the present moment, the connection body-mind

Awareness is the base of everything. The process of awareness requires time. A lot of patience and daily practice is needed to apply it and train not only the physical, but as well the emotional and mental bodies. Breathing is the bridge between body and mind.

Breathing is natural. Breathing is always there.

exploration

Exploring is to pay attention to the act of dancing while is happening. Exploring a principle is to do it through a specific task. Using the previous physical preparation of “release and connection”, we will investigate the body weight shift, observing and perceiving while the movements are generated. The relationship between our body and gravity can be used playfully, because the inner relocation of body weight produces movements. How does it function from the body into space? This is the very core of the exploration. The elementary task of transferring the weight creates an ongoing motion, an ongoing transition in which being into a vertical axis and being out of it is constantly alternating. The first basic and simplest example is walking. From simplicity we will shift to complexity.

This time frame also concerns asking questions and/or a verbal sharing of personal experiences.

composition

What to do with what we notice: composing together.

There is a possible change of awareness happening by bringing the exploration (improvising while witnessing what is happening while it is happening) into composing (taking a decision, selecting, proposing). By bringing the experience of dancing from an exploration phase into composition we can deepen the knowledge of the principle. Each participant will propose 1 or two movements and we will bring them together, in the moment, finding the connection and transition between each other. Each move will be a consequence of the other. We will create together a dance variation based on the experience of “vertical into out of vertical into vertical”. This simple idea leads to ongoing motion in space and a clear, specific movement language.

I like to consider the work as an opportunity for observing, feeling, experiencing, exchanging, confronting and dancing with joy.