18 - 22 March 2024, from 10am to 5pm
Espaço da Penha, Lisbon/Portugal
In 2024, O Rumo do Fumo begins a series of training courses focusing on improvisation in contemporary dance. We begin with the American choreographer and dancer Mark Tompkins, whose CV is unrivalled in this area. Lasting one week, this workshop aims to bring together people interested in improvisation in dance and the performing arts, in order to share ideas, tools and creative levers for this work.
When improvising, each performer is working simultaneously on many different levels of perception; listening, watching, sensing, acting, reacting to one’s self and one’s partners in a given space and time. The art of real time composition resides in the ability to remain open to the wealth of internal and external impulses AND to receive, process and propose material in an uninterrupted flow of feedback. How to stay attentive, how to avoid overload, how to do nothing and still act?
These are some of the questions we will address through a series of improvisations, games and simple scores, from solo to group, that explore vision, listening and touch. Then, we’ll practice performing the essential keys of Real Time Composition: the question of choice, intuitive and voluntary states, simultaneous time, letting go, the relationship between the performer and the witness. Moments of analysis accompany the atelier.
