P.O.R.C.H. / Alternative Conservatory Training module May 24-June 20
For professional level dancers, improvisers, movement artists, and performers who are available to be in a physical discourse engaging contemporary forms of dance, physical performance and training. In order to acknowledge the talents and skills of each participant, we dive into our own body and its innate intelligence. We make available our individual range, dynamic and capability, to become potent as a group, working in a way that is informed and enriched by each other as well as the input from the training facilitators. Each individual is expected to work at their full potential and understand their limits.
The Training module is collaboratively created and curated by Stephanie Maher (Ponderosa) & Kathleen Hermesdorf (La Alternativa). The Alternative Conservatory (AC) and P.O.R.C.H. Combine and channel their forces into an immersive and intensive month. As co-teachers, conspirators, and curators, the directors offer within this container, a training ground for the serious practitioner. The focus is on the body and contemporary movement forms, as well as the individual co-existing with others and in nature. The work is a bridge between classic and contemporary modalities and we meet at the intersection between the precision of honed movement techniques and refined technology, and the freedom of improvisational forms and challenging/stimulating/natural spaces.
2010 Faculty
Kathleen Hermesdorf, Stephanie Maher, Nancy Stark Smith & Mike Vargas, Maria Francesca Scaroni & Vania Rovisco, Peter Pleyer.
May 24-29 K.Hermesdorf, S.Maher
May 31-June 4 K.Hermesdorf, S.Maher, Maria Franscesca Scaroni & Vania Rovisco
June 7-11 K.Hermesdorf, Peter Pleyer
June 14-18 K.Hermesdorf & S.Maher, Nancy Stark Smith & Mike Vargas.
June 18-20 Contact Jam
June 18 Underscore Initiation/Nancy Stark Smith
June 19 Global Underscore-Nancy Stark Smith
June 20 Module 1 official ending
Daily schedule • Monday-Friday 10.00-11.00 Energetics, somatics, yoga, passive alignment, authentic movement,body work 11.00-13.00 Release-based techniques, motion techniques, inversion work, partnering, ci-techniques16.00-20.00 Creative process, repertory, thematic perspectives, improvisation, composition, performance forms
(Times are subject to change and will work flexibly around intensive guest workshops. Please check website for details).
Creative process GUEST WORKSHOPS:
Our guests teachers have some special requirements for the work they will be offering. We will have a clear working process for each class. If you are unsure if, from the experience you bring, you have the required skills for a particular guest workshop, we will discuss this with you and, if necessary, tailor a suitable alternative for you during a visiting guest workshop. In bringing in the Guest Workshops we allow a way to dialogue and get new input from outside visitors. Be prepared to deal with spontaneous events during our 4 week training program.
After 3 weeks we will have a form of closure/harvesting, allowing us to be ready for and open to the fresh input of Nancy Stark Smith & Mike Vargas’s workshop. (If P.O.R.C.H participants don’t have at least intermediate CI experience, or wish to pursue other studies, we shall develop and provide an alternative training responding to the make-up of this particular group.) Nancy’s workshop invites a very intense and in-depth study of Contact Improvisation. The group will be made up of participants who have previous experience of Nancy's work as well as newcomers to her teaching, making a diverse group who enrich the week by bringing a wide range of understanding of the form. The end of our 4 weeks links to the beginning of the Ponderosa TanzLand Festival with a Contact Improvisation Jam open to the wider, international, public. We prepare everyone for the various shifts: in being mindful, in listening, in various technical forms and in social forms!
The Guest Workshops (briefly – full details on the P.O.R.C.H Training Module Guest Workshops page):
Nancy Stark Smith & Mike Vargas contact improvisation "mini-States of Grace" workshop, intermediate Contactors.
This Guest Workshop is open to the public (price: 210€, plus food and accommodation costs- see Ponderosa Guesthouse page)
Maria Franscesca Scaroni & Vania Rovisco
contemporary body, zeitgenösissche körper {body_time_space}
The physical body is trained to modulate energy through dynamic meditations and chi cultivation practices, looking at the body-entity as very charged matter, able to strategize itself, shifting constantly between being a shape, an image, an object, an animal, a system. Working with and in space, time and presence, each body will be engaged and challenged in a question-making process concerning improvisation and its tools. How to sustain an improvised thought or action? How is such action transposed into the space? How do we engage composition?
This guest workshop is open to the public (price: 175€ plus food and accommodation costs- see Ponderosa Guesthouse page).
Peter Pleyer guest workshop!description coming soon!This guest workshop is open to the public (price: 175€ plus food and accommodation costs- see Ponderosa Guesthouse page).
Price for P.O.R.C.H Training Module: 1500€
Food, housing and all Guest Workshop fees included!
P.O.R.C.H. Training Module application deadline April 29th
10% reduction on P.O.R.C.H. Training Module for applications received by April 1
max.25 people
*Note P.O.R.C.H participants wishing to participate in Nancy's workshop ,should get their P.O.R.C.H applications in by April 1, No need to apply to Nancy's workshop separately: please state your CI experience on your P.O.R.C.H application. (Also 10% reduction for P.O.R.C.H.Training Module (module 1) for applications received by April 1)
*We highly recommend committing to all three P.O.R.C.H. Modules for an expansive range of body based techniques and compositional forms, to enliven your work as a performer, improviser or teacher. If that's interesting for you, apply for all three Modules by April 29th and get a reduced price.
