Exploring Contact with Lional Lishoy

On a cloudy, rainy day in Bangalore, in August 2014, a group of bodies met at Just Dance Studio to explore contact improvisation with facilitator Lional Lishoy. Just Dance Studio is perched on the 3rd floor of a building in Frazer Town, with marvelous wooden flooring and windows that look out onto rooftops and treetops. The group that gathered included dancers, musicians and non-dancers, all of whom eagerly jumped at the chance to dive into contact.

Lional, who is an avid contact improviser, led a session,emphasising the art of listening through the body. He began by allowing participants to become comfortable with their partners and their own bodies in silence.

We sat down on the floor and each supported the other, creating a kind of breathing architecture. 

connecting through contact

The important thing here was to listen to our partner and connect through the breath; becoming aware of ourselves and them at the same time. Far from being asleep, we felt intensely awake and aware. 

From that initiation point, one partner supported the other as the ‘mover’ responded to stimuli from the environment, both internal and external.  As the mover explores the environment, the supporter helps in providing opportunities to go further, and is also discovering movement along the way.

supporting movement

We continued on this journey while Lional drew our attention to key points such as exploring multiple options of support and observing the difference between supporting a partner and controlling them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqKWeu5ft58

Initially, participants worked with closed eyes in order to stimulate other senses of perception and later on they opened their eyes to integrate sight. Roles were then exchanged to allow everyone to experience the process fully.

The group was extremely positive about the work.  As one participant said, “For me, the whole session was about exploring the point of contact, support, and listening to your partner. I felt awesome at the end, because these concepts appeal to me. I could explore my own body while working with someone else’s.”

Koogu by Anish Victor

Body, mind & spirit with Butoh

Upcoming Butoh Festivals:

Proposal letter from Rhizome Lee of Quiet House.

"India Rhizoming Tour 2014-2015"

11 Jun 2014

Dear Friends

This is the first proposal letter for

"India Rhizoming Tour 2014-2015"

In this Autumn-Winter, 2014 two Butoh Festivals.

1. 9th International Butoh Festival Himalaya November

16-26 at Subbody School HImalaya, Dharamsala

2. 2nd International Butoh Festival Delhi, around December 3-10 or more.
at Quiet House and Zorba the Buddha, Delhi

After then, we are starting Rhizoming tour all around
India with workshops and collaborations,  performances at various
places with various members.

Rhizoming tour India Facilitators and Organizers

Facilitator: Rhizome Lee, Agu Tara, Ankur Pandy

Organizers (expected): are the following.

3. Assam: organized by Monuj,
Middle of December for one week or two weeks.

4. Manipur: organized by Srujit
End of December or beginning of January for one week or two weeks

5. Auroville: organized by Kaeridwyn January, 2015 for one week or two weeks

6. Pune: organized by Snehal February, 2015 for one week or two weeks

7. Mumbai: organized by Shamaayal or Sai, February, 2015 for one week
or two weeks

During workshops or end of it, we will have performances at a theater,
cafe, nature, or on the street.
Also, collaborations with various Artists, Sculptors,
Instalators, musicians, visual artists and so on, flexibly.

These names of place and organizers are just a proposal by Lee.
If you are able to join in, please inform us soon.
Any unique ideas, experiments, proposals are welcome!

Till now, through these years experiences, we found

proper rules as the following;

1. Each organizer can decide the place, time and the fee

of workshop for participants freely, depend on each

conditions.
At least organizer pay the trafic fee from previous
place to own place and accomodations to facilitator from the income of
workshops.

2. About the rest amount of workshop income, organizer takes 40%, and
pay facilitator 60% of it.
Organizer can use the amount for free purpose,
advertising, promotion, support poor participants and so on.

3. For old subbody students, 30% ---50% discount for the participation fee.
Organizer can decide how much percent discount depend of the condition.
This is to activate the Nomad-rhizoming development
among old students and participants.

4. Local participants pay the workshop fee at the first
place.
If some of them want to join in the rhizoming tour to
the next place for workshops and performances, the fee is free. They
have to pay for only transportation and accomodation fee by
themselves.
This is to activate the total rhizoming process which
connect freely and separate flexibly, and exchange among different
creators in India and the World.

Let's keep contact and slowly fix the detail together.

--Rhizome Lee

- See more at: http://www.quiethouse.in/blog/india-rhizoming-tour-2014-2015#sthash.khvbywXz.uKYGFwsc.dpuf

Dancing with the Daffodils

William Wordsworth might have been pleasantly surprised to find his poem come alive in (of all places) South India. One of our arts-in-education projects took place between November of 2013 and January of 2014 at the aptly named Daffodils English High School. The facilitators were Karthik Raj, Archana B. Nair and Swasti Sharma who gives us an account of her experience.

Swasti Sharma: 
The children at Daffodils school are an extremely cheerful and enthusiastic bunch. The junior batch (classes 4 and 5) and senior batch(classes 9 and 10) are a group of highly energetic kids who have a willingness to learn absolutely any form of dance. Of course they prefer Bollywood over other forms but their zeal for contemporary, floor sequences, hip hop and even ballet is equal. Every Thursday and Friday at exactly 3:00 pm these children gather in the allotted room for the class. Their energy and happiness is so contagious that my travel and rehearsal fatigue just disappears. 
I taught them a small choreography on the song "Nagada sang dhol" from the movie Ramleela, which they grew immensely fond of, and they eventually forced me to choreograph the whole song for them. They were so happy to dance to this song that they were always ready to repeat it again and again. Once the children developed an interest in the classes, I introduced a contemporary sequence to the song "Tere Naina" which they enjoyed as well. These sequences became so important and dear to them that one of the students came up to me and asked if they could perform it in some event or school function. Unfortunately there was no such opportunity in the school curriculum during the session. 

I loved teaching them and it is incredibly satisfying to see smiling and happy faces after the classes. I'm eagerly waiting for the next session to start so that I can continue this interaction and help them learn and enjoy dance more. I'm sure they are equally eager as well.

The Daffodils

William Wordsworth, 1770 - 1850

I wandered lonely as a cloud
   That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
   A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
   And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
   Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
   Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A Poet could not but be gay,
   In such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
   In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
   Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.