During the first sensory exercise, placing my hands over Laura and being the over body, especially trying to roll Laura over from the hips, really surprised me with how much you have to release yourself to fully explore the tasks at hand.Whilst Laura’s hands were placed between my lower back and in between my shoulder blades, I found tension between and around my shoulders that I had never noticed before which led me to wonder as to why I had tension there? What was I doing within my dance practice to collect tension there? So I focused a lot more during practical classes on loosening my upper body, and I’ve noticed a lot less tension within my body.
As the exercise move forward we looked at the power of ‘non touch’ which as Laura lifted her hands away from my back I still felt the connection between me and my partner, and the stretch Laura had made and the connection I had made between my lower back and my shoulder blades, I realised that connection is still there and can cause different types of movement even when the touch is barely made, I experimented with this during the improvisation jam.

During the whole first exercise I realised how important sensory movement is during contact improvisation, When I placed my body over Laura’s and we experimented with an over and under dancer, it took me a second to realised where my body was in relation to hers and to fully release onto her.
I started to think about the connection between the breathing and if I was to start moving how this would affect Laura and how she would move with me and the possibilities of movement that could be created.
The Weight baring and trust exercise also brought my attention to sensory movement, as it was important to really understand where your partner can take your weight and which parts of there/your body are stable enough to hold the other person’s weight, yet still be interesting and unique.
‘To be alive and to inhabit a body is to be continuously and radically in relation with the world, with others, and with what we make of them’ (Bannon and Holt, 2012, 217) . Ellsworth argument in the ‘Touch’ reading, really relates to how I felt during not along this exercise but towards contact improvisation in a whole, I feel like I need to start making relation with how I feel towards other people and make the connection from myself to them.

The one thing that really scared me about contact improvisation was trying to remake connection after it had broken and where to take it.
Doing the exercise which included sitting back to back with my partner and exploring the movement first just through the back and then leading towards the floor and over and under movement.
At first I found this difficult as I wasn’t sure as which way to move with Chloe and how to make the connection, after breaking the connection and returning to the original back to back position, I closed my eyes and started to zone into my spine and the vertebrates and feeling them along Chloe’s back and making the full connection, the exercise started to become easier and the movement just flowed into other movement.
I learnt during this exercise that if something didn’t go to plan or you lose the connection, not to just give up and move on to another person to make the contact with, but to return to the original position and offer them something different.

When we were first told about the improvisation jam on a Thursday evening and how we would be mostly dancing in the dark, especially with a foreign body in the space, I have to admit it was the last thing in the world that I wanted to do.
However, after being the space and starting with a few warm up exercises including making a ‘conversation’ between you and your partner, I think really helped me to take a deep breath and go for it.
I never thought I would walk out the class and be excited for the week that is to follow, I felt comfortable with the people around me and moving in ways that I never really thought my body would, making the connection with people and having the conversation in the dark through touch. Dancing in the dark, really helped my confidence especially with the glow from the ‘outside world’ really made me feel like I was in a different place entirely.
Working within the contact with partner was easier for me, as I could experiment more with movement and the things we have learnt within the past couple of weeks during contact improvisation.
Being able to stand back and watch the movement that was forming was incredibly interesting as well, seeing how different bodies moved with different people, and I found myself thinking ‘I could try and start with that kind of movement next week’ or ‘I could try and experiment with that next week and see how it ends up’

‘In our culture touch itself has become a vulnerable commodity. We know that in the unifying moment of touch there lies the potential for unequal power relations that can be detrimental to one or both parties.’ (Bannon and Holt, 2012, 219), This quote really does show some of my thinking towards contact improvisation and it is especially a fear of mine, something I know that I will overcome with time and my confidence will grow.

Overall, I’ve started the process of understanding the communication of touch between two people and how little or bold that touch can be can fully vary the movement create.
To me it’s a game of ‘give and take’ the more of your body you give to your partner and the more trust you put into your partner to support you and flow with you, the more movement and flow you will have.

Bibliography –

Bannon, Fiona; Holt, Duncan. (2012) Touch: Experience and knowledge,Journal of Dance & Somatic Practices Vol. 3.