Performing the unutterable : mapping the experiential in contemporary dance

This research project looks to engage audiences in a variety of experiential ways by reexamining and manipulating the traditional presentation paradigm for viewing Western contemporary dance. It considers how the audience may be situated in the creation and presentation of contemporary dance generally, and specifically in the work The Voyeur, which researched these issues in action. By situating the body of the audience member as a site of understanding and meaning making, this practice-based research considers the audience within the artists’ creative process from the inception of a creative work, rather than after the work has been created. The research questions how a ‘lived experience’ of contemporary dance could be deepened for the audience. It presents a series of ‘tools’ to create alternative frameworks of presentation that challenge the dominant modes of creation, presentation and meaning making in contemporary dance. The five tools established and applied in this research are: site, liminality, agency, proximity and performer authenticity. These tools are framed as a series of calibrated scales that allow choreographers to map decisions made in the studio in relation to potential audience engagement. These scales have the ability to house multiple presentation formats from the traditional to the avant garde and open up possibilities for broad analysis of a wide range of artistic dance works.

Creative adaptations: Integrating Feldenkrais principles in contemporary dance technique to facilitate the transition into tertiary dance education

As conservatoire-style dance teaching has traditionally utilised a hierarchical approach through which the student must conform to the ideal requirements of the conventional technique, current discourse is beginning to question how dance training can develop technical acuity without stifling students' ability to engage creatively. In recent years, there has been growing interest in the field of somatics and its relationship to tertiary dance training due to the understanding that this approach supports creative autonomy by radically repositioning the student's relationship to embodied learning, skill acquisition, enquiry and performance. This research addresses an observable disjuncture between the skills of dancers graduating from tertiary training and Australian dance industry needs, which increasingly demand the co-creative input of the dancer in choreographic practice. Drawing from Action Research, this paper will discuss a project which introduces somatic learning approaches, primarily from Feldenkrais Method and Hanna Somatics, to first-year dance students in their transition into tertiary education. This paper acknowledges previous research undertaken, most specifically the Somdance Manual by the University of Western Sydney, while directing focus to the first-year student transition from private dance studio training into the pre-professional arena.

Mapping the experiential in contemporary dance

The research questions how a ‘lived experience’ of contemporary dance could be deepened for the audience. It presents a series of choreographic ‘tools’ to create alternative frameworks of presentation that challenge the dominant modes of creation, presentation and meaning making in contemporary dance. The five tools established and applied in this research are: variations of site, liminality, audience agency, audience-performer proximity and performer qualities. These tools are framed as a series of calibrated scales that allow choreographers to map decisions made in the studio in relation to potential audience engagement. The research houses multiple presentation formats from the traditional to the avant-garde and opens up possibilities for analysis of a wide range of artistic dance works. This research presents options for choreographers to map how audiences experience their work and offers opportunities to engage audiences in new and exciting ways.

Traces from elsewhere: Nomadism, artistic identity and contemporary dance in Ireland

This keynote presentation explores the connections between nomadism and artistic identity formation by interrogating the creativity that migration elicits and the narratives that surround it. It is further situated in the complex role that emigration has in Irish culture questioning whether contemporary dance in particular is emblematic of this socio-cultural phenomenon. These questions are anchored through descriptions of a creative project currently underway that draws together artists from Ireland and Australia to explore how we manage absence and presence in a globalized yet increasingly virtual world.

Follow your heart and something will come : subjective factors in the sustainability of early to mid career contemporary dance artists

This project comes out of a desire to investigate the subjective factors that influence how and why people become and stay dance artists. When dance artists in Australia earn, on average, $27,000 per year, and only $16,700 of that income is dance-related, according to David Throsby’s (2003) recent study for the Australia Council, one has to start to think that maybe sustainability, that is, artists’ ability and willingness to stay within the industry, is not solely governed by economic factors. One has to also start to think that subjective factors, things to do with the value, satisfaction and quality of life dance artists get from what they do, might be as significant, if not more significant, drivers of sustainability than pure economics.

Korean 'Chung-soh' and Australian contemporary dance

This project investigated a characteristic concept of Korean culture, "Chung-soh", to develop an understanding a 'Korean-ness' in dance and of how "Chung-soh" informs cross-cultural dance processes involving Korean and Australian artists. At the same time the author developed her artistic identity through investigating and understanding her dance practice. The DVDs contain 2 works choreographed by the author: Cross sections and Embryo.

Practising research, researching practice : thinking through contemporary dance

Practice as research is now an accepted mode whereby artists can obtain a higher degree in our universities. But what conditions pertain for them there? Daily experiences of the misfit between the university, particularly in its current corporate guise, and the embodied practices upon which I draw have helped me, paradoxically, to clarify certain dance values which can perhaps have wider resonance. These values relate to concepts and ideas that can be found articulated by many practising artists and a number of other thinkers and practitioners including Winnicott, Alexander and Arendt. Focusing on here and now practicalities and issues, such as the nature of the studio floor, this article explores and argues for the importance of aesthetic experience and attention to life as we are living it: to experience, paradox, action, and sensation.

Development and assessment of an incremental fatigue protocol for contemporary dance

Nine trained contemporary dancers performed a modality-specific, heart-rate-monitored, choreographed fatiguing dance protocol with an assumption of fatigue at volitional exhaustion (RPE 16). Postural stability was assessed as the variability of ground reaction forces and the centre of pressure during the performance of a flat-foot arabesque. Psychological response was assessed using self-reported fatigue, psychological distress (PD), and psychological well-being (PWB) (Subjective Exercise Experience Scale). After reaching RPE 16 in 15.7 ± 2.6 mins, heart rate decreased to the post-warm-up level within 64 ± 9 sec. Variability of ground reaction forces or the centre of pressure was not changed. There were no significant changes in fatigue, psychological distress, or psychological well-being. Within fatigue, there was a significant increase in the item tired (p = 0.04). As supported by the heart rate data and RPE, the protocol achieved an appropriate level of physical demand. No changes in the stability indices were observed, possibly attributed to the rapid recovery in heart rate. The expression of only tiredness suggests the use of a disassociative attentional style by the dancers. The project represents pilot work toward the validation of a monitoring process that supports dancer health and awareness training.