Imagery For neutral Spine

I recently took part in a Pilates Teching class and just thought it would be great to share my imagery for neutral spine. i think this will really help with our other classes because we should always find a neutral stance before every lesson. Though it might be of some help:

• Spirit level hip bone to hip bone and must not move
• zipping up a pair of trousers, that will activate the transversis
• Breath and relax
• Naval sucking down a plughole on the breath out
• no tension in the neck
• Staying parallel
• let the skull float!

Enjoy finding neutral spine!

Florence Peake Workshop

So recently we took part in a workshop with artist Florence Peake. We basically had a blast by being creative in our Duet partners mapping each others movement on paper with pens. Myself and Ban had a good time creating and listening to each other in moving and drawing.

We experimented with pressure, force, body parts, heavy, light, rolling, stamping

Basically anything we felt like we could do on a big sheet of paper. while our partner would draw what they found interesting ont he paper. there were times where we smudged and creased the paper but thats all part of the creative process so we made it work.

We experimented with imagining painting the paper with our whole body in different ways, we had to get every part on the paper, i.e ear, arm pit and inside thigh!

I think it would be great to do this again but with differnet mediums such as paint or charchol. we would get messy but we could experiment more with whatever our bodies desire to do!

I enjoyed moving more than drawing around ben. i think it was because i enjoyed creating different sounds and working with pressure on the paper more.

Here are the end pieces!

GREEN@CU, COLLECT, CATEGORISE, RECYCLE

So after we did our own exploration of sculpting objects we saw and participated in "COLLECT, CATEGORISE,RECYLCE" by the third and second years for a project running at the university. It took place in the Lanchaster Gallery.

I had alot of fun taking part in this as we got to use the items in the space as clothes, making the items into patterns and even got to take anything home we wanted as part of recycling the items at the end of the performance. We spent half an hour just moving items around and basically playing with them to create a durational performance, i guess to anybody that just watched didnt have half as much fun as what I did!

Find 3 objects... Go!

Right so in preparation for seeing the Recycling piece from the third and second years we did our own little workshop. We found 3 objects and what we had to do make sculptures by moving the objects one at a time.

My findings were:
It was great to use the radio so it didnt just become a visual piece.
was great to see how others interpret the objects and place them places where I wouldnt
Arranging ourselves within the piece was good because we could explore the spaces we created with the objects plus we ourselves became part of the piece.
each object had its own properties so i questioned, What did it feel like? How does it move? How does it support a body? What can it do?

Here are the images of our own sculpture we made.
Artists: Whole Class!

A kick phrase from Florence Peake

Okay so this is a phrase we did with Florence Peaka a while ago and I just wanted to share this with you and any comments would be great. I'd like to know if it flows well? if you can see how my core is engaged to be able to keep balance?

I think doing Pilates and Yoga classes really helps with stabling my body when my Apendage skeleton moves more than my core Axial skeleton

Artists: Abbie H

Letting my Skull relax

In this phrase there are several places where i need to let my head relax. i need to learn how to just let the crown of the head feel the gravity and just "send my head" down to the floor. An example of this in this phrase is when i do the handstand. if you lok closely i raise my head which comes from my previous training in acrobatics. where i should be keeping my eyes on the ground below me. this is to get a nice long line in the spine. when i look up it breaks the line and creates tension in my neck which could lead to injury, this supports my body story in keeping my Axial Skeleton in line.

Another place is where i roll on the floor. I could let my head fully relax on the floor and give the weight of my skull to the floor. having tension around the head and neck can lead to prooblems later on in life

Artist; Abbie H

Just another Phrase

Whilst looking at my documents I recorded this phrase we did in technique lesson. My main aim for this phrase is to keep the fluidity and smoothness throughout whilst letting the head relax.

I found from watching this back that I hold alot of tension in my feet. This is due to my background in Ballet and modern where I have been taught to always keep my feet pointed. I have learnt from watching this back not to be afarid of realxing in the feet when they are resting on the floor. the less tension i have to more it will flow i think, plus it will help with relaxing the whole body.

Also I have found keeping low to the ground in the swooping motion into the downward dog is a it difficult for me due to have longer legs, it means i have to stay lower for longer whilst making sure my legs are in the correct position so they dont hurt or get twisted up.

Artist: Abbie H

Siobhan Davies Scrapbook

When I started University I did not know who Siobhan Davies was but was interested as to how she has contributed to modern dance in this era. On her website http://www.siobhandaviesreplay.com/ you canc reate your own scrapbook of her work that you are interested in. I have mainly used my scrapbook to help me create new ideas from her pieces. Plus I am very interested with the still images of artists in different body lines. I like how the body can be tested to be able to create these amazing shapes and lines. For example this image http://www.siobhandaviesreplay.com/record.php?id=1904&view=metadata from "Plain Song" 1991 shows me just how the body can move and make a great shape in the space.

Although my scrapbook isnt very big at the moment I would like to create a new scrapbook that involves more video work and the creative process to show me how one idea can be developed into a final piece.

Year 2 IPP preformances

A few days ago we watched 4 year 2 pieces of work. Each 1 was very different and unique each exploring and answering questions about themselves and society.Below are the programme notes we were given along with my thoughts and feelings.

The first piece was by Fiona Jackson and entitled "The traces left behind". I think preforming in an Art gallery itself made the piece very visual and calming. There was something about the quiteness as well as I watched the performer explore with art materials and her body on paper and on herself.

 "Stages" by Oana Rotariu was the second piece I feel was an exploration of a very personal emotion the artist has. Her stimuli was a photo of her Grandmother and so her experience would be very different for her and the audience. She worked with material and how they felt and moved. I like the uniqueness as everytime she moved the material it changed everytime.

 The thrid piece was "Behind the mask" by Julia McCaughley. This I felt was the piece I connected with the most because it made me question just how material things like make up are. It made me question just what is perfection? and how make up is a comfort blanket for most women.

The last piece was called "fieldwork" by Joaba Tischkau. This piece to me was a little more complex and I did feel the space she performed in was perfect because I just thought I was invading her space and that I was watching her in her room. This piece I think deals with OCD as she arranged all of her things into catergories and colours. She also spoke in her native language of German. Which added an extra layer, the piece became audioable as well.

Sculpting in pairs revisit

So from a previous post myself and Steph explored with sculpting with our bodies. It was suggested we filmed our exploration and see how each transition happened. Here is the video, I hope you enjoy it. I think from this video there is alot of good ideas that can be explored further. For example adding in movements or changes of levels in a more precise way to make it a little clearer of how each shape is formed with our bodies.
Artists, Steph D, Abbie H

Playing with Sight and Sound, Duet Rehearsal

Ok so in this rehearsal we decided to play with how if you take sight away we really on our other senses to make sense of our surroundings, and in this case we used sound. In this video Ben has his eyes closed and I am moving around as quite as possible. The aim for Ben is to find where I am in the room and for me to keep Ben guessing as long as I can. This is an exploration and will hopefully lead us onto something solid to put in our duet. I think this exploration works beacuse in everyday life we don't really pay much attention to our hearing, and when we do we can see it gets enhanced when sight is taken away.

As the person trying not to much any sound I found it difficult to move around the space and when Ben got close to me It was difficult to move out of the way. However I did like what happened to my movements because my body was more aware of what was happeniing to it. For example I worked through my feet to make no sound.

As for Ben it must be difficult to move around in the space with his eyes closed as he is moving around trusting his own instincts to move to where he thought he could hear sound.

If you would like to comment that would be great on your thoughts from this exploration :)

Todays Warm-up

We started todays class with doing our warm-up we usually do working on alignment of the body and in particular for me the alignment of the skull and allowing the skull to float. i tried to imagine strings from my ears into the air and my ears shooting up into the sky almost like a puppet. I am then suspended by these strings allowing the skeleton to just hang and the skull to float. During the warm- up I was thinking about the crown of the head being the highest point of the body. rising up onto the balls of the feet whilst the arms are in second position, allowing the shoulder blades to spread across the back and the arms to lengthen right up until the fingers are lengthening out into the space, allows me to really think about relaxing the tension in the skull and jaw. This also gives me a chance to practise stacking each bone on top of each other aligning the skeleton into the correct position. For me having a floating skull is really important as I have always been taught to lift my chin, this of course causes the skull to be out of line with the spine. I will always be thinking about the floating skull during lessons to help me improve.

Does anybody know any more warm- up examples to help me feel my floating skull?

Phrase from SRT, Florence Peak

This is a phrase we learnt from when we had Florence Peak come in a lead an SRT class. The idea for this is to really think about dancing on a big pillow, especially at the start when I am rolling around on the floor. this is to help me find a state of total relaxation. This poetic imagery really helps me understand how to move as visually it is clear for me to make sense of the movement.

This choreography isnt what I wouold normally do. This focuses more on suspension and force all through the breath. Also I am trying to make the moves flow into one. There should be no fixed point in the dance and it should blend into one.

Artist: Abbie Hannaby

Feedback:

Does the imagery of the big pillow work for you and why?

Any feedback on the video to improve?