after 2 contact-jams : organic, sustainable choreography

where does my special enjoyment of "amateur"-fluid, minimally pre-designed dance that is created in the moment based on minimal agreements and rules come from? 

i have participated in two jams based on contactimprovisation, one by Roffa CI and the other yesterday at Contact Zone, both in Rotterdam, the Netherlands

the dance is in the moment, it works, it fully uses all already existing structures, patterns, personalities, energies, conditions and lets them interact beyond what they would each do on their own. there are clear objectives that can safely allow individual variation with each iteration, ideally these variations and their conscious performance are the point.

such an example was Asymmetry of the Embrace by Snježana Premuš at the Allee plaza in Budapest, May 4, 2025 during the symposium Contemporary Somatics - Bodies Today 

if I had to use a metaphor, these kinds of dances create groups of flowers, at times mushrooms, that grow in the wild. they grow directly, of their own accord, there is no further extra intervention necessary. everything that happens happens as it needs to and is therefore congruent, which is a prerequisite for survival, since there is also no extra support and no guarantee.

on the other hand, professional dance as it is practiced more traditionally, would then be the equivalent of growing flowers that are cut for export. part of me rejects this practice both in dance and in daily life altogether as unsustainable and harmful. 

then, there are hybrids that do point to a way forward, such as Dobra Voda, also performed at this symposium, at the MÚ theater in Budapest, by Zrinca Šimićić with Bernadett Jobbágy. there was a pre-defined installation of objects and a pre-defined sequence of tasks, partly specified movements, imagery etc. this sequence was repeated a number of times, if I remember well it was open how many. each time the iterations became variations in the moment, giving full openness to how exactly the performer would literally go through the motions. 

knowing what to pre-determine, why, trying this out, finding out what works sustainably, by means of rehearsal, remains a basic task of choregraphy. it is possible to re-visit existing traditions, practices etc. but these must not be used mindlessly or without questioning, which risks abuse and their own destruction. 

those so-called somatic practices which acknowledge the fullness of human experience, individual variations, bodymind connections, without pre-standardizing them for everyone, work with, not against the human senses of the practicing individual, create a kind of ecology that is conducive to such organic, efficient choreography. 

of course at some point a practice becomes hollowed out, no longer enough, just as change, development and evolution are inevitable. then it is important to ask for what was the aim, what were the means pointing at, are there others available or do they need to be developed? is the aim still what we want? (love, peace, happiness, safety, freedom ... and dance)

Laban & Co. ?

having inherited a new set of books, all reflecting areas of dance and dance history and dance theory, I keep coming back to the enormous heritage created by and on the instigation of Rudolf von Lábán. 

i also keep thinking as I survey even just briefly through books such as Lábán's "The Art of Movement" and the extensive postulations, all backed by notation, models etc., is how much of this heritage could have been helpful for the next generations of dancers, also in the "postmodernists" in the US of A - Anna Halprin on the West Coast, the echos that became Judson Dance Theater on the East coast, with Elaine Summers creating her very own lineage as a pendant to Halprin, let alone post-War European dance artists. this entire heritage seems near lost today, submerged into immediate, sensorial spectacle, echoing forms of forms of forms created before. (continued with artificial intelligence modells) 

following through on the ever more detailed and intricate, sensorial understanding of movement and dance that have emerged, from Francois Delsarte and Genevieve Stebbins, all the way to Charlotte Selver and Elaine Summers (Sensory/Kinetic Awareness) how can we make use of this inheritance? 

it is understandable that a first generation just coming off European-formulated "Classical ballet" and its becomings wished to remain open, all too often going into Indian and Chinese-based bodymind systems and -traditions instead, from Yoga to Tai Chi and Chigong. but there is more, and more to keep developing, whether "serial" choreography echoing "serial" composition in 20th century "classical"-derived European/American music or their further developments into aleatoric, chance-based, improvisatory strategies. 

in a certain sense, one could say that European-derived choreography became ever more organic-understanding, the rather superficially pre-set mindset releasing into every more sensorial-present states. with Mary O'Donnell-Fulkerson's attempt at syncretizing both extremes into a single perspective (Open Form Composition) a wholesome understanding has emerged that allows this development to come to full-circle and start moving.

zen-e? : the beach, in line, three

this week I got to try the first two scores with non-professional dancers age group 55+ in Rotterdam. working with and controlling flow, from open and free to condensed and in full and close control, seems to be a choreographic concern of creating tension/movement in space with a group of dancers/movers as well as physically with a single body. 

i keep perceiving music in such terms, as abstracted physical human-body (character) movement, with·in the kinds of musical languages (e.g. https://www.wassilykandinsky.net/work-50.php )