Contact Improv class [Nijmegen]

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Weekly Contact Improvisation lessons in Nijmegen 🌺

~ 𝘑𝘰𝘪𝘯 𝘶𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢 𝘥𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦-𝘧𝘶𝘭𝘭 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘪𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘤𝘵 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘷𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘣𝘰𝘥𝘪𝘦𝘴.

Johanna and Alkis lead the class sometimes together and sometimes alone, each time diving into a different perspective of the rich practice called Contact Improvisation. Each session is designed to welcome new participants, yet the best way to start is to join the first class of the month! 🗓️ Each month the lessons are inspired by a different theme, exploring different directions within this container, while linking the practices for the ones who join more often 😊

In May the theme is... Flowing like a river
This month we will work with flow and continuous movement. How do we follow the flow of movement without directing it? How do we read the pathway of our partner in order to catch their wave. We will do some group work, and also moving bases and yes… lifts!

♦️Practical:

Wednesdays 18:00 - 20:00 (come 10 or 15 minutes in advance to change and warm up)

Studio "upstairs" (after entering the community space of the Circus Space, climb the stairs left of the bar and then turn left once more.)

Dressingrooms available - also upstairs and to the right.

Afterwards there's optional plantbased potluck and open circus training until about 22 o'clock (with 5€ additional contribution, paid on the spot). Kneepads are _not_ necessary 😉

Via this platform you can buy either a loose ticket or a seasonal card for 10 lessons, the later offering some discount and bonuses. Please choose a price that feels right for you, considering that we already do our best to keep the prices affordable for the value we believe we have to offer 🌹

♦️About the practice:

Contact improvisation is a dance practice developed by various pioneers in the 1970s, in which physical contact is central to the creation of movement. Dance becomes a play with gravity, weight sharing, touch, and imagination.

♦️What to expect from a session:

In these weekly classes, we offer tools to achieve movement. We go into technical principles about your body and lifting another body. We give different ways of approaching dance that might change your perception.

We start every session with a warm up of all layers: physical, mental, emotional, etc. The class is built around open tasks that leave enough space for you to fit in, with the energy, and/or limitations that are present with you on the day.

Whether you're new to the practice, or want to upgrade your experience in jams, this is a class for you!

♦️Important detail!
If we are with 4 people or less, we will change the structure of the lesson into a 'lab'. As facilitators we will still offer a guided warm up and from there we go into a collective movement research. In this research we will investigate an aspect of Contact Improvisation. We decide collectively which aspect we will focus on. A lab is accessible for both beginning and experienced dancers.

About the facilitators:

♦️Johanna Sauër

Johanna is a dancer, choreographer and educator. She graduated as an artist educator in dance from Artez in 2022. She then did further training in contemporary dance and choreography at La Faktoria, in Spain. Contact improvisation is a great fascination for her, she enjoys the physical play with gravity and the possibilities another body gives her in her dance. Additionally, contact improvisation is for her a learning path in relating to other people.

♦️Alkis Barbas

Alkis grew up as a dancer in the cultural scene of Thessaloniki, Greece and later moved to the Netherlands to follow a bachelor of dance in Arnhem. He's been working as an interdisciplinary performer since the end of the lockdowns in 2021. Alkis has had a rich path in movement through physical theater, martial arts, butoh, folk, classical, urban, and contemporary dance forms. Alongside the dance studies, he has explored various ways of training that maintain and grow avail-abilities of the body and mind, while keeping it healthy. This is what brought him 3 years ago to pick up teaching Contact Improvisation and facilitating jams for dancers of all levels of experience. He has since guided hundreds of people in finding their own dance journey and their authentic way of relating to others.

“In my practice and in my class, I place care highly in my priorities, without compromising the search for excitement and individual limits. I love connection, I love to combine playing with learning, and I love to share my passion for movement.”

🌬️❤️ We are looking forward to seeing you in one of our upcoming lessons!