BY DANIEL DAVIDSON

 

 

When stuck whilst creating, I find the following tasks helpful in generating movements and ideas.

 

1. Body Part, Direction, Energy.

For this task, you will need to write three lists.

The first list is for parts of the body. For example: left leg, right shoulder, tip of nose. Think outside of the box and select unexpected body parts such as the left ear lobe, the tongue or behind the knees.

 

The second list is for directions. These can be very simple or very complex, up to you.

Left, right, forwards and backwards are all great but you can also think more abstract. Maybe round, diagonally low to high and up might provide some inspiration.

 

The final list is for energy. Think of words like softly, quickly, sharply and energetically.

Once you have your three lists written down, cut your pieces of paper so each small piece has one word or phrase on it, organise them into their three piles, and shuffle whilst face down.

Pick one from each pile and place them side by side. Using some of the words from above, perhaps you have picked:

Body Part – Right Shoulder

Direction – Up

Energy – Softly

And there you have it. Your first step. This may sound quite simple (and it is), but challenge yourself to create unexpected directions and you will end up generating some very interesting and complex movements. Stitching them all together will create a very unique dance phrase.

 

 

2. Poems.

I’ll often ask the dancers I’m working with to generate movements through what they read. I find that the language of poetry often generates very visceral and textured movements. I ask that the dancers create movements that are very literal. For example, if a poem has the word ‘queen’ in it, the dancer may create a movement resembling them wearing a crown, their hands cupping their head as though their hands are the crown.

Often dancers imaginations are so creative, more so than I am. It’s how you take the movements they’ve created and turn them into a piece of dance. When I say the word ‘swim,’ what action do you think of? You probably did a ‘front crawl’ kind of action with your arms. But what if the dancer in front of you chose something else? A diving action, a back crawl, a doggy paddle? How can you take whatever they thought of and add it to a dance sequence you have already made? Maybe the front crawl movement looks great/interesting/weird (in a good way) when they do it during in an arabesque…

 

 

3. Keeping Contact.

Possibly my favourite task is asking dancers to create duet material staying in constant contact. Usually I will have a section of dance material already generated that I will teach the dancers. I will then pair them up and ask them to manipulate the material by changing the order of the steps, changing the speed of the steps and changing the levels of the steps. For example, if something was originally a jump, can it be changed so it is lying down on the floor? I then ask that the dancers always remain in contact with one part of their body, always connected to the others. This body part can change frequently. For example, Dancer A connects their left knee to Dancer B’s shoulder for one movement and then they change, and, Dancer A’s chin is now connected to Dancer B’s chest and so on. During this, the dancers are attempting to dance movements from your sequence. You will find some really interesting ideas develop from this.

Often the dancers will become uncomfortable, their bodies not managing to correctly ‘dance’ the original material but often, the most interesting ideas develop here. Some of these accidental ideas might inspire you further and make you reexamine what you’ve already created, sending your work in a different direction.

This might not be (and often isn’t) such a bad thing.