Let’s Improv It
Movement Research Project
Let’s Improv It was held as part of ColLaboratoire-CogNovo multidisciplinary program of Plymouth University (August 2016). A week of movement exploration through collaborative practices and research on embodied cognition, improvisation, kinesthetic empathy and space awareness was followed by an open presentation; A non-verbal, collective facilitation of an experiential, somatic movement session.
By Klara Łucznik, Abigail Jackson, Eleonora Siarava, Aska Sakuta
From the website of ColLaboratoire:
In our research project, we focused on basic human abilities to understand ourselves and each other on the level of actions, intentions, and emotional states. We explored the role and perception of the emotional aspects of physical touch and the ability to touch each other through space. We explored how kinaesthetic empathy allows us to understand others through embodied knowledge of our own states. As a result, we invited all ColLaboratoire participants on the last day to take part in a 20-minute somatic movement experience. We shared our insights and reflection through embodied practice in darkness and silence, trusting the idea that much of the key knowledge in our lives is gained through experience. This way of sharing, which was novel for most in the group, was very well received, and gave participants a new way to relate to touch, their own bodies and the space between each other. Our research, as well as the influence of the summer school’s topics and the group’s social dynamics resonated through the movement of the group, creating a unique experience of sharing the space though individual and collective choices, finally resolving in togetherness in movement and rest.
Let’s Improv It was further presented in various formats at:
- “Dance Fields, Staking a Claim for Dance Studies in the 21st Century” Conference by Centre for Dance Research (C-DaRE), Coventry University, Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Dance (CIRID), De Montfort University and University of Roehampton, 2017, London.
- “Moving the sensate: Questions of Affect and Embodiment for the 21st Century” Conference. Collaborative Participatory Performance: Let’s Improv It’ – Introducing Somatic Experience to a Wider Audience, Centre for Dance Research, Coventry University, 2017.
- “Off The Lip” Symposium
Presentation and publication at the “Off the Lip: Collaborative Approaches to Cognitive Innovation” Avant 8 (Special Issue) 301-310, Plymouth University, 2017.
