Joaquín Alfei (Bristol): Stretching the form: Affor[dances] Contact Improvisation Meeting

Name: Joaquín Alfei (Bristol): Stretching the form: Affor[dances] Contact Improvisation Meeting
Start: 2025-04-12T09:30:00+01:00
End: 2025-04-13T17:30:00+01:00
Location: John Cabot Academy

Schedule

Sat, 12 Apr, 2025 at 09:30 am to Sun, 13 Apr, 2025 at 05:30 pm

UTC+01:00

Location

John Cabot Academy | Bristol, EN

Joaquín Alfei (Bristol): Stretching the form: Affor[dances] Contact Improvisation Meeting
12-13th April 2025
[EVENT DETAILS]
Sat / Sun 12th and 13th April 2025
9.30am to 5.30pm *1.15hrs Lunch
John Cabot's Academy, Bristol, BS15 8BD
[REGISTER]
Places are limited to 30 participants. To register for the event please fill in this Registration form. To secure your spot we ask you to make an initial deposit** of £40, with the full balance paid 4 weeks before the event starts.
Register link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdNulOzWXWpLxXwkaUBwEX6Ia-1SdFvBKJ9JgnyyjeeiQsmjQ/viewform
Ticket Prices*:
Early Bird - £85 - Before 01 March 2025
Full Price - £110 - After 01 March 2025
* limited concession price tickets are available - please enquire via the registration form
** for payment details, please see the registration form

[THE PROPOSAL]
“The world is perceived not only in terms of object shapes and spatial relationships but also in terms of object possibilities for action (affordances) — action makes perception.”
-- J. J. Gibson--
Stretching the form: Affor[dances]
Contact Improvisation Meeting
I have been interested for some time in exploring the question of how to formulate research inquiries.
Research depends on asking the right questions, which might mean asking open-ended questions; questions that allow us to be put into variation by the answers. While science wonders ‘whether this is the case?’ and philosophy wonders ‘what it means?’, dance ponders ‘what happens if I do this again?’ Where the dance and dancer-questioner are engaged with practice as research. This is the perspective that we will adopt for our dances and explorations together.
The term affordances can be thought of as a "relationscape”; belonging neither to the object itself nor to its user but is created by the relationship established between them. How can we reinvent affordances through the continuous dialogue of weight sharing with our partner(s), the practice and the space? With profound focus on essentials of Contact Improvisation, we will dance this (and other) question(s).
Too abstract? In the studio, practically/technically, this looks like us focusing on weight-sharing, falling and sharing/making questions. During the weekend of course, we will dance, we will dance big and also small. I will introduce movement experiences that foster a refined quality of listening, especially during moments of falling, which open dancers to both present and future moments, and allows the ‘letting in’ of the stimuli we encounter in dancing CI.I will also share tools and containers for collective artistic exploration (i.e., dancing scores, sharing words, solo and in groups explorations, watching and listening to different materials) that I have found useful in my dance practice and training, but also tools to stretch our minds. Inevitably, mutual sharing of weight (and falling) is a way of being in the unknowable, we will also find ourselves working and engaging with the unpredictable, placing oneself in the in-between.
- This is open for all levels of experience, beginners, especially for those with curiosity to make questions and to both affect and be affected by (or through?) weight sharing and falling.
- Pedagogical endnote: Together, our experiment is to navigate the graceful comfort of working with pre-digested material that I facilitate, while also (co)creating the beautiful discomfort of the research laboratory spirit in (contact) improvisation.

BIO:
Joaquín Alfei (Argentinian)
Joaquín is a dancer, dance researcher, and doctor in Psychology (KU Leuven – Belgium). Existing in the practices of dance and improvisation, experimental psychology, and philosophy, Joaquín has been obsessed in ‘ways of knowing’ and ‘gestures’ of research in dance improvisation and science. Challenging classical divergences between subject/object, in both his dancing explorations and academic work.
Joaquín has grown thinking-in-movement in Bruxelles and the dance artists who have most nourished him with their material about improvisation and that he has studied with are D. Lepkoff, K.J. Holmes, J. Hamilton, L. Nelson, C. Morrisey, R. Chung, N. Little, S. Smith, M. Kivaldy and K. Nelson.
Viewing dance and (contact) improvisation as multi-faceted, he is presently absorbed in the physical aspects of the study, but too theory, conversation, written and artistic creation. Upon meeting (contact) improvisation many years ago, he found himself centred around the form, dancing and teaching internationally (EU, Japan, UK, South America).
Dance Video Archive Vimeo I https://vimeo.com/user154670378
Academic Writing https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=EqcVWiEAAAAJ&hl=en

[VENUE & TRAVEL]
https://maps.app.goo.gl/hRfBTSuQn7HB7omo9
John Cabot Academy (School) , Woodside Road, Kingswood, Bristol BS15 8BD
50 mins from Temple Meads Station
50 mins - from Bus Station
40 mins from Flix / Megabus / National Express drop-off point (Bond Street)
There is ample free parking directly outside of the venue
Once you have secured a place in the workshop, you will receive a lift sharing document, this can be used to offer and seek lifts to the venue from other participants
The theatre space is located within the school main building. At reception someone will be there to greet you and show you the hall.
[ACCOMODATION]
This workshop is non-residential, although local accommodation is available by AirBnB within a 10 mins walking distance from the venue. Hotels are a bit further away and are located in the center, around 40 mins by public transport.
Once you have secured a place in the workshop, you will receive additional information that may allow shared accommodation with other participants or the local Bristol CI community
[FOOD]
The hall includes access to a kitchen to warm food brought for lunch and a dining area to eat. Food can also be bought on Two Mile high street, approximately 10 mins walk from the venue.
A light selection of fruits, biscuits and teas will be provided at the venue.
[CONTACT INFO]
[email protected]