Materials for the Moment, Caroline Waters
| About masterclass: | Improvisation in performance intensive.
Studying Improvisation as performance art, we practise our ability to create movement from our own physical experience and at the same time follow the rules of a score/structured improvisation.
In solo, partner and ensemble work fundamental elements of composition and performance will be explored: awareness for time and space, dynamics and rhythm, form and content.
Building the skills of the imagination, we foster the ability to respond creatively and intuitively to a moment to moment changing reality and become ready to perform instant composition.
The Workshop will be about using our bodies in movement as a medium to make art; we will look at dancing and improvising as a "poetic" act, blending awareness, listening, and receptivity with intention and creativity. We will focus on real time composition approaches to movement, improvisation and choreography, as we explore and compose the social and physical landscapes in/outside of the context of the dance studio.
Sourcing from external and internal experience, we make connections between the personal, the social, and the physical, looking for a sense of relevance and meaning in the dance.
Drawing from music, movement and theatre practices we will be blending strategies to illuminate, examine and research the process and practicality of making work together. As we create the performance, we will develop movement
scores, imagine scenes and create stories, from this experience.
The work will be grounded in that of ‘The 6 Viewpoints‘- Space, Shape, Time, Emotion, Story and Movement. John Cages 4 Levels of Composition.-Structure, Method, Materials and Form. Augusto Boals Theatre of the Oppressed-Image Theatre. As well as from New Dance Techniques like Contact Improvisation.
| | About Caroline Waters: | Caroline Waters is an Independent International Performance Artist and Arts Educator. Originally trained in Mime and Physical Theatre; she has constructed a body of work located in the use of improvisation in performance as a context for physical research. She trained with the likes of Steve Paxton, with whom she co founded Touchdown Dance, a company that works with sighted and non-sighted dancers, Simone Forti, Mary Fulkerson, Katie Duck, Kirstie Simson in the mid 80’s, and has been deeply influenced by the work of Augusto Boal and the Theatre of the Oppressed.
Mainly drawing from Contact Improvisation and New Dance practices, Caroline teaches, performs and directs in various situations ranging from the performic to the therapeutic. Constantly traveling, she has constructed work in a variety of countries and contexts, often working in groups of mixed language, bodies and experience spanning the West – East coast of USA, across Europe, Eastern Europe bordering into Russia. She has developed work in Mexico and is currently collaborating with Artists from Japan and the Far East.
The work often focuses on collaboration and working with other Art forms and she is especially interested in working with musicians, video makers and writers. Often work is site based and she has experience with a range of non-theatre spaces as locus for performance. She has taught over the last 10 years as a visiting artist at Dartington College of Arts in the UK and has been a guest teacher at the former European Dance Development Center in Holland, The Bulgarian New University, Turku Academy Finland, University California Los Angeles, and for JKSD Slovenia.
She has a passion for festival organization and has been responsible for many International Improvisation Festivals in Europe, including ECITE, as well as being a curator at the CI25 contact birthday celebrations in Ohio USA. She has performed at various international Festivals including New York Impro Festival, Washington DC Festival, Frieburg Festival, Line Space Line Festival Los Angeles to name a few. She is a regular visiting artist in Budapest where she has supported the work of Eszter Gal, both as a teacher and co-organiser, as well as being part of a mixed ability performance group based in Budapest. Caroline has and continues to develop her own body of work internationally as a freelance improviser in performance, both as a dancer, teacher and musician.
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