BODYSURF SCOTLAND: OUT OF CONTACT
From Scotland on Sunday

If you are unsure about what contact improvisation is, think of doing Aikido, surfing, wrestling and dancing at the same time - something like a moving massage.

Bodysurf Scotland is producing Scotland’s biggest single international professional dance event this year and has created a range of Out of Contact ‘access points’ for the public to engage with contemporary dancers of the highest quality and to introduce us to one of the most eloquent forms of contemporary dance to have evolved during the 20th century.

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The "improvisation" in "contact improvisation" can be a framework for making work in the studio and may also involve improvisation on stage. It's not clear what the balance is in these works. However, the comparison with Improv comedians in this article could give the impression that it is all improvised on-stage. I'm sure that wasn't the intention of the knoledgable Ellie Carr.

I've clarified the wording above after a helpful message from djb.

Making up is never easy to do
By Ellie Carr in The Sunday Herald


Improvisation. Not a word that instils everyone with confidence. Especially those who've seen one too many Fringe shows starring rejects from Whose Line Is It Anyway? But as on the TV show, which is inspiring and infuriating in turns -- the art of improv can be gold-dust in the right hands.

Out Of Contact -- a triple-bill featuring work by Findhorn's Karl Jay-Lewin, Italy's Company Blu Danza and Sweden's Bronja Novak -- is a celebration of the lesser-known art of 'contact improvisation'.

This dance form was invented in the let-it-all-hang-out creative cauldron of 1970s New York by post-modern dance pioneer Steve Paxton. In its purest form it's a duet form akin to certain martial arts, using the body's weight and momentum to trigger sequences of movement.

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<small>[ 13 July 2003, 02:37 AM: Message edited by: Stuart Sweeney ]</small>