Szu-ying is a dancer, improviser, and contact improvisation practitioner from Taipei. She received her MFA from the School of Dance, Taipei National University of the Arts in 2018 and has since been collaborating with Ku & Dancers. She has performed in various structured improvisational works, and in 2023, visited the Mirramu Creative Arts Centre in Australia to perform and teach with the company. In addition, she has worked with other dance companies including Intw Studio, Bourrée Studio, and Legend Lin Dance Theatre. Furthermore, her choreographic works have been shown at the PLAY ARTS Festival and the CoDance Festival. Szu-ying is part of the work team of i·dance Taipei and performed in its “Spectrum of Dance Improvisation” in 2019, 2021, and 2023. She has also participated in numerous international CI festivals, and through a scholarship, attended the Nancy Stark Smith January Workshop.
“The dance only lives in the sensorial palette of a dancing body”—Steve Paxton, Gravity What do we sense when we dance? When we come into contact with other bodies and the floor, we don’t know what’s going to happen next, and we’re processing a lot through our body and mind. In this workshop, we’ll try to nourish the holistic experience of a dancing body, sensing the totality of body and space, including our dance partners. We’ll explore the link between body space and the sense of continuity flowing through body structure. With our “holistic body,” we’ll try to feel and imagine the space, listen to gravity and the changing structures, both in ourselves and in relation to our partners, and let all these lead us into the unknown.
David has been practicing and teaching CI for over 19 years. Over the years, he has participated in numerous workshops and festivals in countries such as the U.S., Germany, and Australia, and his investigation into the form is primarily influenced by his studies with well-known luminaries such as Nancy Stark Smith, Scott Wells, Daniel Lepkoff, and Ray Chung. David has been the festival organizer for Contact Festival Kuala Lumpur since 2011 and has taught CI workshops in Malaysia, Singapore, Cambodia, Thailand, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and Germany. He has performed in or created dance works in over 30 locations spanning six countries. David loves to discover the ease and efficiency in moving, and to chance upon the pleasures of not knowing.
Let's get back to the fundamental principles of contact improvisation! By training ourselves to be present, alert, and always ready to react, we will be able to handle the unknown in a more released state. We will then extrapolate this new way of being and receiving into exciting and unpredictable flights, falls, and catches.
Headshot by Anastasia Rytenkova and dance image by Raphael Olivier.
Mimi Lo @ MimiLOPADF (Mimi Lo Performing Arts Development Foundation) teaches contact improvisation at The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts. She is a graduate of The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts modern dance program, majoring in choreography and dance directing. Mimi followed Nancy Stark Smith in 2016 and 2018 to practice CI at EarthDance in the US and undertook the Long Dance Research project at The Dragon's Egg Studio, also in the US. She completed her DanceAbility® Teacher Training in Helsinki, Finland and her ContaKids Teacher training in Arezzo, Italy. Her current focuses are on contact improvisation and somatic dance and movement.
In the practice of contact improvisation, the application of momentum is generally emphasized. When you can master timing and make good use of momentum, your movements would become easier and more comfortable. But what if momentum is removed from the equation? Will you be able to better understand the different resources available to your body and find new possibilities? And then use them to dance in and out of momentum freely?