Moving through planes

I've been talking about the shifting directions of movement through the three planes—sagittal/wheel, vertical/door (also called coronal), horizontal/table (also called transverse).

Rather than slicing the body into sections I like to think of the body as moving within circles of motion, with the movement between all these planes making up a sphere, our kinesphere, which is why I have been using words that imply movement in those directions, the tyre wheel, the helicopter, the knife-throwing or german wheel.

                               

This idea reinforces the knowledge that our bodies are curved rather than straight, and helps us to stay pliant in our approach to our alignment and our dancing. We live in a built environment of boxes and lines...houses, cars, devices...fixed, straight lines and surfaces which do not match the reality of bodies and environment. So, I like to keep connecting to the idea of the flow and circulation of continual motion, like the flow of oxygen through the bloodstream moving throughout the body, like the tides rolling in and out, like the air currents that circumnavigate the globe.

Then, when I am dancing I feel supported by this idea of circulating and shifting between planes like rolling around within a sphere...sometimes close in to the body, sometimes larger than the room.

There is a functional aspect here physically as well. By feeling the connections between these planes I can achieve balance and control. 

In a balance, like tree pose, I am able to sustain and control my balance with ease by applying the three directions of movement simultaneously—the vertical down through the supporting foot and up through the top of the head, the horizontal with the pressure of the foot into the thigh and the palms into each other, and the sagittal by drawing the navel to the spine or activating the front abdominal muscles.

The same principles apply in the turns we have been doing on one leg in turn-out (the low turn in the "Worlds keep spinning" phrase and the turn on rise at the start of the Baby Animals phrase) but the arms are extended to the sides to trace the helicopter plane.

Physical Architecture & Imagery

I find the use of a combination of particular imagery (imaginative visualisation) and tactile information (directed touch with a partner) can assist structural alignment, balance and movement range. Here are a number of images and partner exercises I will at some time use in class.

The flow of energy down the back of the body and up the front of the body.

I often imagine that I am standing half under a waterfall so that the water is flowing down over the back of my body and legs, 

and drawing a zipper up the front of my body

This corresponds with the real physical forces acting on the body, namely the pull of gravity (compression) and the tensile upward thrust of the arches of the body (foot, pelvis, rib-cage/shoulder girdle) through the long bones to spine to head.

(Todd, 191)

With a partner we could trace the pathways of the fascia that interconnects to encase and support all the bones, muscles and organs in the body. We can follow down the "superficial back line" and up the "superficial front line"

and we can follow the spiral line and feel how the sides and front and back of the body intersect

(Clark, 74)

Arches and bridges in the body

I let my imagination move into the interior of my body, to visualise my structure in comparison to architectures I see in the world around me.

I visualise the body as the Eiffel Tower, 

the arches in both planes 
(fwd/back and side/side) 
creating the thrust upward 
to support the narrowing spire of the spine

Multi-directional support

I also imagine myself inside larger structures or forces as a way to achieve balance, support and/or release...to be part of the bigger picture and feel the integration of the whole body at once.

 ...supported by the multi-planes interacting...feeling the longitudes and latitudes...the rooting down under the earth and up into the stratosphere, the support of the air around me...

inside a three-dimensional sphere (kinesphere) 
as in Da Vinci's "Vitruvian Man"

imagining myself connected into the longitudes and latitudes of the globe of the earth 
—the longitudes running down past ears, through shoulders, hips, knees, ankles; 
the latitudes running through the skull (ear to ear), the rib cage, the pelvis

I also refer to the planes in relation to the movement sequences: forward/back as the sagittal or 'wheel' plane; the vertical side/side as the 'door' plane (frontal/coronal); and the horizontal as the 'table' plane (transverse).

To visualise opening in the joints in the body, my favourite image is to imagine my laying torso (in constructive rest with knees up) as an airport main runway, the edges of which run through shoulder to hip, knee, ankle middle toe...and my arms (at diagonals to my laying body) as two taxi-ing runways leading to the main runway...

I imagine each joint lit up as night markers for the runways

Recommended Reading

Todd, Mabel. (1968) The Thinking Body: a study of the balancing forces of dynamic man. Brooklyn: Dance Horizons.

Clark, Bernie. (2016) Your Body, Your Yoga. BC, Canada: Wild Strawberry.

"Established" level technique—areas of focus & the notion of "style"

In this "established" or intermediate level of dance technique my focus for teaching is to offer other perspectives on dancing—specifically how to consider the interaction of the senses in our ways of moving, learning, and living.

—how a visual image might offer new insights on anatomical function and structural alignment;

—how tactile information (touch/sensation) can deepen or augment a visual image;

—how sound and rhythm/pulse connect to breathing, and to our underlying instincts and emotions...

This level of technique differs from the advanced level in that I may not cover as much material, i.e. spend more classes working with the same sequences or teaching shorter, less complex sequences. I may introduce material that is more moderate in its shifts between planes/levels and in its demands for flexibility, control and nuance (stylistic detail). However, all my material to varying extents concentrates on musicality and rhythmic variation, drawing on visual imagery and imaginative ideas,  and bringing attention to how we use our vision and our three-dimensionality in our dance performance.

Dancing is a personal statement and a cultural act—who we are and where we have been (or long to go) resides in our bodies and contributes to our individual "style."

My dance "style" is a hybrid fusing contemporary dance, physical theatre and post-modern aesthetics. There is a deep underpinning in my movement vocabulary of my own musicality and love of rhythm/syncopation (extensive background in tap-dance and music practice and theory) and my pioneer modern styles dance training (Martha Graham and Doris Humphrey via my University teachers) mixed with my interest in the everyday in movement (have had direct experience working with Judson/Post-modern greats Steve Paxton, Deborah Hay, Lisa Nelson, Eva Karczag).

In a teaching context I try to engage and inform students on a range of levels, re-articulating ideas from different perspectives (visual/imagery, kinaesthetic/tactile, aural/rhythmic, anatomical) to broaden their access to or ‘ways in’ to my dance material. In a choreographic context I am interested in extending this approach to facilitate a creative exchange with my dancers, one which enriches my choreographic process and which can support each dancer’s performance narrative.

I have felt a significant pull toward Indian culture, specifically to yoga practice. I was introduced to it at University (my dance teachers) along with jikyu jitsu and qui gong and have been practicing more intensively (i.e. 4-6 times per week) over the past 10–12 years. As my physical practice deepened so has the mental rigor and breathing. I have also spent a considerable amount of time in India over the past ten years and other traces of that culture have seeped in. I studied some Bharatanatyam (Indian classical dance) and Kalari Payattu (a South Indian martial art form) and have found the detail and specificity of gesture and the directness and strength both a challenge and a place that I could enter into fairly easily. The uprightness of Indian classical dance is almost diametrically opposed to my style of rolling, release and floor work but there is also a theatricality and virtuosity that appeals and which sits well with me. I have always been strongly influenced by an eclectic range of musical styles (Celtic also features in my repertoire/heritage) and my trips to India have built my collection of Indian music (Sufi, classical and Hindi/Bollywood). When in India I taught contemporary technique and choreographed a contemporary work on Indian dancers and I think it is the combination of ‘living’ in a culture and having to work out how to collaborate artistically across cultural landscapes that pushes your expressive capacities—you have to analyse and communicate (and often question) where you’re coming from with your western aesthetic, and you have to find ways to meet their physicalities and rituals (of which there are many!) creatively and sensitively.

Whereas your "introductory" level classes may have been about finding basic commonalities with your fellow dancers—of alignment, strength and stretch, use of space and time—now I encourage you to consider your individual aesthetic and potential, your particular inflection in how you interpret and perform the material—to investigate your uniqueness.


Images: Dianne as a tertiary dance student, Adelaide, 1986; dancing with Mallika Sarabhai, Ahmedabad, India, 2006.