"SENSATIONAL MOVES": 9 -12 April . 4 DAY INTENSIVE Feldenkrais, Movement Exploration & CI with Simonetta Alessandri & Thomas Kampe

9 -12 April 4 day Intensive exploring somatic dance practice, Feldenkrais Method and Contact Improvisation.

In this four-day workshop, we combine somatic movement principles of the Feldenkrais Method® with dance exploration & Contact Improvisation practice.
In the morning sessions we will be using ‘Awareness Through Movement’® lessons and touch-based explorations. We will focus on solo explorations and will connect with our core and imagination, deepening our felt sense of gravity and grounding. Through Dance Improvisational practice we will develop our observation skills and individual creative agency to integrate our embodied discoveries, fostering creative risk-taking and playfulness.
In the afternoon sessions we will expand these explorations into the practice of Contact Improvisation to enhance our ability to interact and communicate expressively and playfully with ease and clarity. Drawing on our felt sense and somatic attunement through touch and gravity, we will revisit and refine Contact Improvisation skills and creative vocabularies, such as weight exchange, balance, support and lifts with a partner and in small ensemble situations.
Each day we will take time to discuss or write reflectively about our personal and somatic discoveries.
The Feldenkrais Method®, developed by Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais (1904-1984) is a gentle, embodied process focused on self-discovery, embodied thinking, creative wellbeing, and functional improvement. It invites participants to slow down, listen to internal sensations, and create new neural pathways that support creative choice making in action.
This workshop is open to anyone interested in deepening their dance or movement practice.
Thomas and Simonetta have been teaching Feldenkrais-informed dance classes around the globe for over 20 years and are world-leading researchers and artists in the field.
Dr.Thomas Kampe (PhD) (he/him) has worked as a performer, artist, researcher and somatic educator across the globe for 40 years and was ‘Professor of Somatic Performance and Education’ at Bath Spa University (UK) between 2012 and 2022. Thomas initially trained in visual art and dance and is a teacher of the Feldenkrais Method ® which forms a rich foundation for his teaching, arts practice and research. He is interested in critical somatic arts legacies and his writings and performance works have been published internationally. He was editor of the Feldenkrais Research Journal Vol. 6 ‘Practices of Freedom: The Feldenkrais Method & Creativity’ in 2019, and recently co-edited JDSP Vol. 13.1 & 2 (2022): ‘Embodying Eco-Consciousness: Somatics, Aesthetic Practice and Social Action’.
Simonetta Alessandri is an Italian dance artist & somatic educator based in London. She applies the Feldenkrais Method in dance & movement training and in performance making. She teaches at Trinity Laban, Goldsmiths University and London Contemporary Dance School. Her work is informed by more than 30 years of dancing, teaching and choreographing. Her choreography has been for dance companies, student pieces, large scale opera, improvised performance, site specific and movement direction for theatre. She was one of the few dance practitioners in Italy who began working with CI in the 90’s. She has been a guest teacher in Germany, Colombia, UK, Norway, Israel, France, Switzerland, Italy, Poland, Spain and Taiwan. She obtained the Post Graduate Diploma at London Contemporary Dance School; she is a qualified teacher of the Feldenkrais Method and she holds the Teacher Certificate of the Royal Academy of Dance. She is a founder member of CI@Goldsmiths London.