Workshops

Moving presence Authentic Movement workshop

Ilka Szilagy

The practice of Authentic Movemen will help us develop our concentration and awareness of our bodies and our movement. We will practice how to be present, how to follow our own movement and movement of others, how to describe how we feel, what we see and what we experience with words, at the same time staying fully aware of our own body and its movement. We will take this awareness and mindfulness into contact improvisation and dance with others, giving and receiving only what we truly wish, through the share of weight and our flow together in an authentic way. We will focus on our self and the others, expanding our potentials and opportunities for an honest and truthful play.

Ilka Szilagyi has been practicing and teaching contact Improvisation, Authentic Movement and other mindfulness and somatic practices for many years now. She studied with truly great teachers over the years, and now she feels it is time to follow her passion of sharing this experience with others through teaching, therapy and performance. Ilka’s movement is effortless and but playful, juicy and open to all senses. Her numerous interests are focused around one central topic: the connection and awareness of the body and mind. During her classes and therapeutic sessions she focuses on becoming aware of the sensations of the body and the emerging emotions. She offers to guide those who are interested to explore their inner world with her mindful presence, compassion and tender confidence.

Nature of improvisation in live performance

workshop by Chris Martineau and Sylvain Meret

This workshop will focus on basic principles of improvisation in live performance and is directed to dancers and musicians who would like to enhance their improvisation experience and explore new forms of interaction through improvisation.

The roles are disappearing; the borders of art forms are transcended. Body becomes an instrument, instrument becomes a part of the body. The musician uses its instrument in numerous  ways, always surprising both him/herself and the audience. How to start again and approach the instrument and the body with the curiosity of a beginner and the skill of a professional, letting go of habits and judgments, how to be open to the moment turning the situation into performance, how to be a support and an inspiration for the partner, how to develop an awareness of the moment and ability of instant composition, how to keep being open, in every second, towards the audience and towards co-performers, are some of the questions we will be answering in the corse of this workshop.

Structured exercices will be combined with short open improvisation. The aim is twofold. Primarily these exercices are aimed to expose each individual with the feeling of emptyness, indecisiveness, doubt, being lost but at the same time feeling the pleasure and joy that the improvisation can offer, to discover the other and the support that s/he can give or expects. Secondly the objective is to bring him/her to an understanding and analysis of a performative situation, to enable him/her to face and surpass his/her own limits, and embrace the joy of improvisation…

Chris Martineau, musician (viola, voice), combines and brings together various  contemporary art practices as a performer, improviser and composer. She has been researching musical and textual materials together with musicians, dancers, visual artists and actors, often in relation to architecture and landscape. Her music ranges from classical to contemporary and electro-acoustic, while she continuously does improvised music. Traditional music has always been a source of her inspiration. In the 80ies she worked with Benat Achiary. Since 1994 she has been working with Cie Le Grain under the direction of Christine Dormoy. Together with Sylvain Meret and Julie Läderach she founded the improvisation collective Les Imprévisibles. She is a member of the improvisation quartet Lux Nox Mix (Bordeaux- Budapest), duets Barkatu Bartok and Les Fleurs de Bach. Chris collaborates with circus artists and the sculptor Denis Tricot. She regularly organizes and participates at improvisation meetings in France and Europe.

Sylvain Meret, works as a dancer and choreographer. After visual arts studies (DNSEP degree at Ecole des Beaux Arts, Bordeaux), he attended P.A.R.T.S. school in Bruxelles, classes with Lance Gries, David Hernandey, Randy Warshaw, Peter Goss, Vera Mantero, Thierry Bay, Patricia Kuypers. He combines this knowledge with the following techniques: Body – Mind Centering, Feldenkreis technique, Alexander technique and Qi – Qong. Between 1998 and 2002 he performed in works by Christiana Blaise, Virginia Mirbeau, Felix Rückert, Cie B.Valiente and Martin Sonderkamp. In 2001 he became a memeber of Magpie Music and Dance Company. Since 2002 he has been working and living between Bordeaux and Amsterdam. He has gievn classes at: Ateliers de la Manutention (Bordeaux), Cefedem de Normandie, Summer session workshop (The Tisch University, New York), Animal a l’esquena (Girona) and Pia (Amsterdam). In 2004 he founded Cie Kairos dance company.