DANCE 101G Introduction to Dance and Creative Processes
Schedule
Schedule A: Music, Art and Contemporary Society
Semester
Summer School, Semester One, Semester Two
Campus
City Campus (all semesters), Manukau Campus (Semester One)
Note: Does not satisfy the General Education requirements for BDanceSt or BPerfArts
To develop an understanding of our moving bodies through movement awareness, dance improvisation, choreography, and interdisciplinary arts processes. Students will experience both theoretical and practical classes which focus on a range of practices that dancers and movement practitioners use to facilitate kinaesthetic awareness, experimentation, play, communication and choreography. We will explore somatic theory and practice, improvisation scores, choreography, dance analysis, and contact improvisation. Students will also explore the relationships between dance and other artistic disciplines.
By taking this course, you will:
- Experience a range of approaches to dance as a practice that are accessible for any body.
- Develop your movement awareness through listening to your body, and working with others in the class.
- Develop your movement awareness by practicing ways to extend the exploration of movement ideas onto the page, through reflective writing.
- Explore a range of starting points for dance improvisation using scores, and practice developing improvisation texts in the moment.
- Practice the fundamentals of Contact Improvisation dancing and history.
- Review selected academic journal articles and study specific historical contexts and events.
- Explore the relationship between dance and other artistic disciplines.
Students from any discipline, except dance majors. It is not necessary to have dance experience. This mainly practical paper provides an enjoyable opportunity to communicate through dance. Content goes here
By the end of this paper, you should be able to:
- Confidently enter a dance studio and find a starting point for experimenting with and developing movement ideas.
- Use somatic, improvisation, and choreographic dance practices to develop ideas which grow from perception of your own moving bodies and experiences.
- Understand a diverse range of artistic practices, and confidently articulate ideas around these practices through mediums that reflect the nature of the work and thinking involved.
- Access further information from the literature and appropriate industry networks.
Week 1: Opening up the Space
- Considering “What is dance for me?”
- Discuss Course Outline, Journals, and Participation
- Practical: Starting points, pathways into movement.
- Getting to know each other
- Home Learning: Journal entry – What is dance? What is not dance? Read through Course Reader
Week 2: What is Dance?
- Art, Dance and Everyday Life
- Practical: Experiencing dance through everyday movement
- Home learning: Go to an art gallery and write about three paintings – describe what you see and discuss how they could relate to your dance practice.
Week 3: Somatics 1
- Familiarising ourselves with the term somatic in philosophy and practice
- How do we think through our moving selves?
- Discuss writing dance: essays and reviews
- Practical: Sensing the Spine
- Home Learning: Familiarise yourself with definitions of Somatics on the third page of the reader. Read through articles on Alexander and Feldenkrais. Comment in your journal.
Week 4: Somatics 2
- Somatics and Choreographic Practice
- Somatic awareness into creative process
- Practical: Breathing into Movement
- Home Learning: Read through all information on Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. Comment in your journal.
Week 5: Improvisation 1
- What is improvisation? / How do we improvise?
- What are the skills of improvisation?
- Practical: Lisa Nelson’s Tuning Scores
- Home Learning: Read the article The Sensation is the Image – Lisa Nelson. Comment in Journal
Week 6: Improvisation 2
- What do we know that we do not know that we know?
- Scores, Structures, Synchronicity: Performance improvisation.
- Influence of performance improvisation on development of dance as an art form
- Practical: Simone Forti and Logomotion
- Home Learning: Read the whole article Taken by Surprise. Comment in Journal
Week 7: Choreography 1
- What is choreography, what are the skills required?
- Viewing and discussing work of some key choreographers
- Look for motif, repetition, unison, contrast
- Assessment 1: Choreography and Reviews (Part One)
- Read through Developing dance ideas and developing practical knowledge charts. Familiarise yourselves with the language and terms.
Week 8: Choreography 2
- What are dynamics? Space / Time / Energy / Rhythm
- Discussing the work of key choreographers, observing and articulating how dynamics play in the work. Choreographic Analysis
- Practical: Making and manipulating phrases with a focus on dynamics
- Assessment 1: (Part Two) Choreography and Reviews
- Home Learning: Complete the page on Improvisation in your Reader
Week 9: Contact Improvisation
- Hand in Reviews
- What is Contact Improvisation? Steve Paxton’s Dance Innovations
- Practical: The point of contact / Giving and receiving weight / Filling the touch
- Home Learning: Read Steve Paxton’s article ‘3 Days’ and comment in Journal.
Week 10: Linking dance with other artistic disciplines
- Artistic project due next week
- Home Learning: Read Lindsay Clark article Have we met somewhere before. Comment in Journal
Week 11: Assessment 2 Artistic Project
- Presentation of artistic projects.
Week 12: Exam preparation and Group dance
- Dance workshops
- Lectures
- Video
- Discussion
- Making and performing dance
- Critically reading and responding to articles
- Short choreographies and reviews 20%
(Duet 1, Duet 2, Description, Analysis) - Artistic Project 30%
- Exam (3 hours) 50%
"It was always the highlight of my week."
"It was always a very positive and uplifting environment."
"Overall it was a fun experience and I became more confident."
"I thoroughly enjoyed the course. I built up confidence in myself and all aspects of learning."
