Week One Notes
1/14
-Introduction/syllabus
-Designed to help articulate creative process
-Finding depth in the way we communicate
Reflection
Considering this course is designed to help articulate the creative process, I look forward to diving deeper into choreographic tools and articulating my movement vocabulary efficiently. In analyzing the importance of communication, I have discovered that physical movement can only say so much. I have found comfort in my craft by communicating through movement. However, by following the natural routine of dance, I believe I have missed opportunities to verbally articulate my emotions. Throughout my training as a dancer, my instructors did not allot the opportunity to verbalize thoughts and emotions in the training process. In working with choreographers through creative processes, opportunities to participate through communication seldom presented itself. This lack of opportunity has produced discomfort in me verbally expressing myself. Oftentimes my thoughts challenge themselves, which can cause incomplete thoughts while speaking. Because dance is my passion, I am eager to absorb terminology that can elevate my vocabulary in communicating my craft to others.
Week Two Notes
1/19, 1/21
-Exploring improvisational exercises
-Connecting the real, imaginary and emotional
-Recognizing personal movement, relationship with others and group movement as a whole
-Reading “How to Teach Improvisation”
Assignment: Create a mock improvisational exercise
Improvisation Exercise Part 1
Today we are going to create movement by exploring the real, imaginary and emotional components of your object you brought to class today. We will start with a short group warm up to center our bodies as one with each other and the space.
-Personal movement: Real
-Relationship with others: Imaginary
-Group and movement as a whole: Emotional
Group Warm Up
Start by walking
Come back to center
Exploring the Personal/Real
-Analyze your object
-Is it heavy or light
-how does it feel
-how many ways can you hold it? Does it need to be held? Can it support itself?
-how many ways does it move
Create a 2 eight count phrase based on the real aspects of your objects
Exploring the Relationship/Imaginary
Using your two eight count phrase
-imagine your object is extremely large
-how many ways can you move around your object
Exploring the Group/Emotional
-how does your object make you feel and why is it significant to you
-how can you make the real aspects of your phrase come to life with emotion
-sensing the movement of the group play with tempos and levels
-If someone is moving slow, can you move slower or faster.
-if someone is moving high can you move in a lower level.
Reflection:
In creating my improvisational exercise for class, I was excited to combine the elements we discussed in our class reading. For this assignment, I wanted to present the opportunity for my peers to bring in a personal object to generate movement by exploring the real, imaginary and emotional components of their object. Considering improvisation is rooted in personal choices expressed through movement; bringing in a personal object to stimulate a movement vocabulary connects the emotional aspect of exploration immediately rather than later. In planning my lesson, I created questions to inspire and help my peers in translating their emotions into movement. We were only allowed 15 min to demonstrate our exercise. Because I created questions that required a little more thought, I could see that I planned too much material for a 15 min demonstration. In creating lesson plans, I have struggled to find a happy medium in presenting information. I hate spending too much time on one exercise, however there are some exercises that truly need to be flushed out to produce an authentic outcome. In making this realization, I can connect my impatience in exploration to my lack of creating a new movement vocabulary for myself. When improving or creating new movement material, I start with an idea and sometimes can become bored with that idea. This exercise made that very clear for me.Although I may be bored with an idea, it is insufficient for my students to be robbed of the time to fully explore the idea I have presented to them. In the future, I want to challenge myself to thoroughly dive into an idea before moving on to another one. By exploring compositional structures in this class, I believe the desire to explore an idea or movement phrase in depth will present new possibilities that I typically would miss by moving too fast.
Improvisational Exercise Part II
Lesson Title: Arnold Palmer
Today’s exploration=Half and half
Splitting the body in two parts vertically and horizontally
Group Warm Up:
Walk around with giving them cues but also challenge them to think about half and half
-Tempos/rhythms
-Levels
-Direction
Give them an object
1. Explore some movement that connects to what stood out to you when analyzing your object. Whether that be realistic/literal components or emotional connection to the object such as an old memory. Take 2 min
2. You can choose to use the same material or you choose to explore new material. Think about ways you cut your body in half. Vertically, horizontally or lateral. Think about ways you can cut the material in half. Take 2 min
3. Demonstration
Staging
Morgan: downstage stage right facing the back
Derreck: center. Walking up and downstage throughout
George: Entire phrase walking around the space
Reflection: For part two of this assignment, we were asked to restructure our exercise and continue the lesson. In noticing I provided too much material, I decided to focus on splitting the body in half while also holding onto the inspiration from the object my peers brought into class. I can honestly say by narrowing this lesson down, the outcome was greater than the first time. Having a clear concise objective in my lesson plan seemed to be beneficial in producing the emotion and movement vocabulary I was searching for. I found that by starting my exercise with an improv based warm up, it allowed the dancers to be in tune with their bodies. Oftentimes, I create warm up material based on what I think my body needs. In exploring this exercise, I realize that if I want organic movement, I should guide the dancers in a warmup that allows them to focus on what their body needs rather than what my body needs. This exercise also helped me realize that the idea of chance isn't so bad. For the third part of the exercise, I created stage directions for the dancers to demonstrate their phrase. I found these directions to be very interesting. Last semester we learned about how different placements on stage say different things to the audience. By experimenting with stage directions and chance, new possibilities emerged naturally. Although there were some I liked and some I did not, the idea of creating by chance is actually amazing to watch right in front of your eyes. In the future, I wish to dive deeper into taking chances in my work.
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