Bondage, Bonding, Binding, Bound. We will start this workshop with some physical exercises, clarifying the important role gravity plays in the mental and bodily construction of ourself and how the temporary negation of gravity in suspension bondage affects our perception systems “Restricting the body in order to free the mind”, “ Being entangled in order to disintegrate” “ I tie you up to let you fly” We will practice and reflect on those “bondage paradoxes”. Bring your own rope, if you have…

Read Felix Ruckert’s Biography

Exploring the contact with the air among others by moving your body with the help of low flying trapezes. Especially the skin can touch or move the air, but also the body can be extended by other materials (e.g. strips of linen, cloth, material, robes, floggers, etcetera). Also from the outside the moving can be influenced by interruptions of the flow (can be done by hands but also by tools such as a flogger)

Comparing the movement and sensibility of the skin, bones, muscles, nerves when the body as a whole is moving already because of the trapeze and you are free to experiment and to move in and out of this movement while being moved anyway (or not!), comparing all that with the senses that are awakened when working on the floor.

Low flying trapezes can be used alone or together with others to move on and to play with. The trapeze is your partner, so you will always make a duet (or, if another person appears on the trapeze, a trio).

The floor will be starting point, resting point, contact and meeting point; on and off you can go. The movement continues.

www.skinneraerial.com (movie 4 and 5 for a very sweet vanilla version of what’s in my mind)

Read Wim Franken’s biography

My own interest and engagement in this experiment is to have the opportunity to share that which calls me to the jam. My questions include:

What is happening energetically when we are in a state of physical consensual communion with another/others? Where do the barriers naturally come in and where they dissipate? What defines awake: immediate, constant, surrender, compassion, powerful, vulnerable, aggressive, undetectable, undeniable, integral and paradoxical?

Research Proposal – Ki Dialogue

Just as contact improvisation can be perceived as a series of dance moves, tricks and learnt acrobatics, Aikido can also be seen as a sequence of martial techniques likened when performed well, to a dance. The reality for me however, is that the essence of these two art forms could not be further from this understandable misconception. It lies somewhere in the intimacy of a graceful oblivion which, when I try to think through, conceptualise or anticipate often becomes mechanical, uninspirational and cumbersome instead of vital, frank and breathtaking.

In this class/lab we will explore:

• unilateral/multi-directional Ki extension
• directional awareness/clarification
• a touch based sense of bodily articulation
• injury prevention
• awareness of muscle tension/relaxation and its clear links with mental tension and or projection
• principles of traditional Ki Aikido in order that we might then bring them with us to the jam
• surrender to the naturally occurring oscillations of contrasting forces that arise from the act of two bodies moving together

As well as Koichi Tohei’s principals of non-hierarchy and universal love, in my experience trickery, disappearance, play and seduction are all woven into the art of peace.

This class/lab will be held similar to a traditional Aikido dojo class, consisting of the formal exploration of martial techniques including immobilization.

Read Richard Sarco-Thomas’ biography

How is doing this affected in practice by the gender of the people, or race, by their proficiency in the verbal languages being used? How about if one is a teacher and one a student, if one has learning disabilities, if one is well known and experienced and one a newcomer?

Many of my explorations of these topics have taken place within the queer community. I feel that queer and Contact Improvisation perspectives have so much to teach each other and am excited about the opportunities to link my (sometimes) separate explorations of the two. At the Copenhagen Queer Festival last Summer I taught a Contact Improvisation workshop titled ‘Queer in Motion’.

I believe that learning to recognise and respect each other’s physical and emotional limits can be incredibly liberating and enabling of creativity and exploration, therefore I would like to contribute to creating a Safer Spaces Policy for the event, and procedures for maintaining the event as a safer, creative space for exploration. I would also like to offer a workshop exploring these topics through movement and discussion.

Read Rachel Dean’s biography

In Touch and Play I would like to create a space for exploring the “strong dance”, in which I want to integrate my 20 years experience in different martial arts forms (Judo, Aikido, Savate/Kickboxing and Boxing. It could be called a fighting laboratory, which provides a high state of awareness and presence to ensure a safe and joyfull experience for all participants,especially for people, which are not used to play with their “stronger energies” pushing, wrestling, jumping on each other can be part of the vocabulary…

Bad Contact

I would also like to explore “Bad contact”, in which we could each explore stretching the limits of dancing with our partner, including the use of lips, teeth, unusual areas of the body (or even tearing off each others clothes or slapping)

Read Ulli Wittemann’s biography