Studio Practice + Process: Play Effort Catharsis (DAN4807B.04)

Shayla-Vie Jenkins & Rena Butler

BFA students only

Jenkins: This class aims to maximize each student’s movement possibilities in a safe, yet rigorous container. We will hone our kinesthetic awareness particularly focusing on the perception of weight and gravity in movement. Class begins with floor work, drawing from meditation, yoga, somatic practices, and Laban/Bartenieff developmental movement principles. We will set a tone of comfort and wakeful sensitivity as we find ‘floors’ of support in the body, space, and sonic environment. Using set and improvised center and traveling exercises, class will progress into movement ideas that attend to weight and momentum shifts, dynamic stability, specific body part initiations, resiliency, rebound, and sequential thinking. We will further these investigations in detailed phrase work that will build throughout the semester.

Butler: Course sessions are playfully geared towards kinetic + intuitive investigation while sharpening useful tools to deepen a multifaceted approach to an artistic experience. Classes begin with guided imagery, exploring both fluid and stabilizing exercises to inform various structures in the body. Sessions then flows into dynamic phrasing that encompasses improvisational tasks, floor work, detailed gesturing, musicality, and more.

Course dates: November 21, 2024 – December 13, 2024

Shayla: Mon/Tues
Rena: Thurs/Friday



Learning Outcomes:
Students will be able to:
-Foster critical thinking about the dancing body and ways of moving
-Combine and organize a body practice that reflects on and supports the physical demands of the expanding fields of dance research and performance
-Integrate movement through the frames of time, space and poetics
-Demonstrate readiness to assume the working life of a professional dancer, whether in academia, world stages or within one’s community


Delivery Method: Fully in-person
Prerequisites:
Previous dance experience required. This course is available to BFA students only.
Course Level: 4000-level
Credits: 3
M/Th 10:00AM-11:50AM & 1:40PM-3:30PM, T 10:30AM-12:20PM & 7:00PM-8:50PM, F 10:30AM-12:20PM (4th module block)
Maximum Enrollment: 20
Course Frequency: One time only

Categories: 4000 , 4th Module Block , All courses , Dance (BFA) , Fully In-Person , Three Credit
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