Movement exploration: embodiment beyond the dance floor 9 dates

Do you enjoy connecting to your body on the dance floor and want to take this a step further? Would you like to feel connected to your body when you're not dancing? 

Do you enjoy the state of mindfulness in sitting meditation and would you like to nurture it when you're moving? 

Are you tired of moving the same way and would like to explore new and surprising ways to move? 

Do you feel how much depth the body holds and would you like to venture on a journey to explore it? 

If any of these strikes a chord, then this course is for you!

The classes strive to bridge the gap between sitting meditation, dancing and everyday movement by bringing the awareness of meditation and the embodiment of dancing into our everyday movements. We will look at how to unlock the potential of our constricted bodies by becoming more aware of the patterns they are shaped by, while reconnecting with the innate ability to move we had as children.

In the classes I will guide you to tune in to what you feel in your own body, to listen to its sensations and to let them guide your own movement. By developing more awareness of how your body moves and what its patterns are you will be able to open the doors of its untapped potential and let it speak. Eventually the mind will take the back seat and the body will lead the way. The aim is to develop your own movement vocabulary and expression in a way that fits the uniqueness of your own physicality and ability. 

Purposefully, music is not used for this class so that we can learn to focus on how we moved without extra stimuli. I will teach you instead to develop your sensory awareness and to move with the environment and the things that are within the environment as if they were your dancing partners. Instead of music, you will discover that sounds, colours, shapes, light, movements, and many others things can guide your movement. 

The classes are open to all ages and abilities and no previous experience is required. The only thing that is needed for these classes is an open and curious mind and a willingness to explore the unknown.

What to expect:

• Explore new and unexpected ways to move your body 
• Explore the art of improvising and of moving your body with full presence
• Respond in movement to simple movement invitations and scores
• Develop a heightened sense of awareness and of your senses when moving
• Become more aware of how the environment influences your movement
• Be witnessed and witness others when moving
• Self-reflect and share in pairs and in groups about your experience
• Be held in a supportive non-judgemental learning space

Facilitator bio:

Claire is a movement artist, somatic practitioner and teacher. She works with improvisation, unstylised movement and eco-somatics, that is to say spontaneous nonverbal dialogue with the environment, both natural and urban. She has trained with Suprapto Suryodarmo, Sandra Reeve, Ruth Zapoorah, Daniel Odier and regularly attends contact improv jam in London. Her movement art practice is strongly rooted in her relationship with non-human beings such as plants, fungi and the ecology of a landscape. She is the author of How to Be Feral: Movement Practices to Re-wild your Body, a philosophical movement book which challenges our human-centered perspective of the world and encourages us to think with our moving bodies and not just with our mind. She is also an insight herbalist, graduate from the School of Intuitive Herbalism where we learn directly from the plants.

To find out about Claire's movement and teaching style watch this video of her moving and inviting to move your own way

You can also watch more videos of her moving @howtobeferal