Sarah Chien
May 1 - footwork = floor work
May 8 - improvising ourselves:supported solos, with Emily Faulker
10am-12pm
SUGGESTED DONATION $8 OR PAY WHAT YOU CAN
BROOKLYN ARTS EXCHANGE

For this season, Sarah Chien offers two unique expansions on the work of David Zambrano and her teaching research into Flying Low and Passing Through. As the founder of Floor Friends, Sarah has spent the past several years researching ways that we can move into and out of the floor and direct our energy through space dynamically, energetically and creatively with other humans. Our feet are the entry point of our connection to the floor and their movement is the basis of most dance forms. And if footwork is where floorwork begins, then improvisation is where it ends. Solo improvisation asks us to take our training and create something personal, honest and connected. We'll explore both sides in these workshops!

May 1 |  Footwork = Floorwork
What does it mean to stand on your own two feet? How can vertical work also be "floorwork"? This workshop presents different ways in which we can learn to hold our ground, find stability through the floor, and discover movement possibilities from the ground up. We'll work with improvisation, and train rhythm, balance, multi-directionality and agility. We'll follow the information we get through the soles of our feet up through our whole body to connect to the room around us. The entire room will become terrain for our walking/running/spiraling dance. The material for this work was developed from the study of David Zambrano's Flying Low and Passing Through with ideas from Qi-Gong, and master movement teachers like Tomislav English and Tom Weksler.  


May 8 |  Improvising Ourselves: Supported Solos
"Dance like somebody IS watching". Sarah Chien and Emily Faulkner have both been developing their solo improvisation practice for years, in search of honesty, uniqueness and connection in solo performance. Emily brings approaches from Alexander Technique and Sarah’s for scores and games in the teaching tradition of David Zambrano. This workshop shares scores and practices for finding your best solo improvisation performance. Emily brings approaches from Alexander Technique that help us disinhibit and awaken the body’s possibilities. Sarah offers scores and games she's developed in the teaching tradition of David Zambrano. Like a good story, an improvised solo should be personal, true, and have a beginning, middle and an end. We'll perform for eachother, work on developing an idea in the moment, and seek ways to reveal something about ourselves through movement. We've found that when you improvise with a friend you not only do your best dancing, you also see the best dancing.

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About sarah

Sarah Chien is a dancer, improviser and world traveler. She spent the last 4 years as a performer with Andre Zachery/Renegade Performance Group and now creates her own improvised works with various collaborators. She has also been a company member of Sydnie L. Mosley Dances (founding collaborator of The Window Sex Project), and toured internationally with Jody Sperling/Time Lapse Dance. Among her influential training experiences she counts living in Ecuador, studying at Barnard College, working with Elia Mrak, practicing qigong with Daria Fain and participating in Deltebre Dansa.

In 2013 she founded Floor Friends, an organization through which she curates and produces independent classes, workshops and occasional performances. 

About emily

Emily Faulkner, artistic director of Emily Faulkner Dance, creates dances which combine rigorous structure with improvisation. Her work has been presented by Wesleyan University, the 92nd Street Y, Movement Research at the Judson Church, the Philadelphia Fringe Festival, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe through Bookings Dance, New Dance Alliance, Triskelion Arts Theater, the Santa Cruz Dance Festival, Center for Performance Research and many other organizations. She has performed in the works of many ground-breaking choreographers, including Yvonne Meier (in the Bessie awarding winning “The Shining”), D.D. Dorvillier and Jennifer Lacey.
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A certified teacher of the Alexander Technique since 1999, Faulkner is currently on the faculty of Movement Research where she teaches dance improvisation, and is the movement coach for Steady Buckets, a youth basketball league, and the Downtown United Soccer Club.

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about this series

This series is geared towards the professional development of dance teachers, and as a mean to offer affordable training for the dance community.

​This series is a part of the CREATING SPACE Program. Funded in large part by the Lambert Foundation Fund of Tides Foundation, the CREATING SPACE Program provides opportunities to support and develop artists of all races, backgrounds, cultures, sexual orientations, gender identities and aesthetic traditions.