Ensemble dance evaluation:
Our goal was to create an ensemble dance/physical theatre piece for our performance in November. This piece takes inspiration from Motionhouse’s work 'perfect', it has a stimulus of time and explores the ideas of "waiting, nurturing and growing" and touches upon feelings of being out of control- as if being manipulated by unseen hands as well as the idea of our individual perceptions of time. We mind-mapped what we felt "Time" meant to us or what time itself is/ what it represents, some ideas included: that time is a social construct that we all conform to, the stages of life e.g. both as a child and an elderly person we require looking after, personal development and panic. The chosen style for this piece was contemporary, components of this dance style include: Floor work, Flexion, Contraction, (High) release and spiral- pioneered by Martha Graham; Use of the torso, tilting, twisting, curving and arching- pioneered by Merce Cunningham; and various others like: use of parallel, body percussion and gestures.
In our final performance, I personally think that my use of extension and suspension is very strong between 0:40-1:00 as all of the suspended reaches and falls link to the idea of reaching out for help in moments of panic and rush, and also create a contrast to the sharp dynamics of the kicks and jump with splayed hands. I also believe that my suspended travel backwards into the fish roll at 2:30 links to the theme of being pushed and pulled by the unseen hands of time. Additionally, I think that my use of focus was strong throughout my performance (specifically at 0:58) and that this helped to convey the idea that I was panicked and on edge again linking to the stimulus of our perception of time.
However, I need to improve on my transitions between movements for example my turn into round de jambe at 1:19 looked off-balance, this may have been due to the large step I took into it resulting in me having to shift my weight back into my right foot in order to do the round de jambe, I could improve my transitions between movements by focusing on developing my core strength and could therefore, have better control of how I place my weight when ending/entering various movements. I also need to focus on my alignment in my attitude with my left leg as at 5:46 my knee is lower in height than my ankle, in order to correct my alignment, I need to practice by watching myself in the mirror and focusing on using my turnout to effectively hold my knee slightly above the height of my ankle.
When composing this piece, I personally found creating movement that was suitable for those I was working with quite difficult at first, as I have a larger dance experience (especially in the contemporary style) than all of my peers and I wanted to push myself and showcase what I am capable of. I was able to overcome this by working with my peers to create ensemble movement that we were all capable of executing and focusing on how I can use expressive skills to improve my performance, for example I believe that my use of focus at 1:19 makes me appear more confident as my eyeline is high and therefore gives the illusion that the turn is cleaner and more controlled. As a stronger dancer, I struggled with performing with a lesser confident group in regards to timing, as they often relied on me for timing I felt responsible holding this correctly- which is something that I wouldn't normally find to be an issue. However, for example at 1:17 I had to hold back on the timing as the others hadn't gotten up as seamlessly as I had and therefore if I had continued with the correct timing I would have looked wrong and out of time. As a result of this, I now feel as if I have a better awareness of those around me, and even though we were all out of the original set timing, we were in time with each other and that allowed us to perform better as an ensemble.
I believe that I worked well with my peers and also was able to develop my leadership skills throughout this project. For example, I feel that I worked well with my peers when creating our trio, travelling phrase as I taught one of them how to do a fish roll, which she wasn't able to do before, as well as making sure that I went through each movement she found difficult to understand, to help to build her confidence. I also think that I worked particularly well with Charlotte, as we had to create a short duet for the beginning of the piece, as we communicated well we were able to create an effective phrase that used counter-balance to show the way time pushes and pulls us around. Initially we found this task quite difficult as we were confined only to our kinespheres, however when I suggested that we should remain linked throughout the phrase this made the task slightly simpler as we had already made contact when I stop her running. I believe that when I taught Jamie and Amy mine and Charlotte's duet and adapted it to suit their spacing is a good example of me taking leadership, I think that I lead them effectively as I broke down each movement for them as well as clearly demonstrating with Charlotte how each of the movements should look.
During the course of this project I think that I have greatly improved my ability to take leadership as at the beginning of the year I was afraid of being overpowering or taking too much of a lead in group tasks, but I accepted that I naturally fell into the role of leading due to the fact that I have a larger dance experience in comparison to my peers. This fact also meant that I wasn't overly challenged by the technique, so I focused on developing my movement vocabulary by developing movements in different ways- e.g. retrograde, inversion and embellishment- in order to create new and innovative movement. In the future I would like to focus on improving my ability to teach movement to the class confidently, in order to do this, I need to regularly step to take lead an ensure that I break things down for everyone to understand and if someone is struggling with a particular move then I need to help them by finding an alternative that they feel confident with.
Duo composition evaluation:
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