Iris Professional Practice Blog

FINDING MY AOLs

Last night's group Skype was a first opportunity to truly listen to the other students on the course and have an overall feeling of the process at hand. I'm a keen observer, so, not being able to physically see other students, I ensured I would listen well.

As an artist I've had many hats, kind of goes with the job I've been told many a times.
Part of this ability to jump from role to role quite effectively is the ability to compartmentalize and just focus on what you need to achieve. As a commercial choreographer there's never much time to experiment with movement and ideas. The work is intense and fast moving. You immerse yourself in your imagination, prepare your choreographic sections and deliver. The ability to deliver a good piece of work in a short time is in itself a skill in high demand. A dancer I've worked in the past used to call it "choreography by the metre".
It was only when I won a dancers fellowship a couple years ago that for the first time I had time to reflect, think and look at my own creative process in more depth.
I enjoyed the calmness and ability to observe and try ideas without pressure. I tried different stimuli, explored a different facet of myself and drew various conclusions. As a creative artist, my best ideas ideas are created when I'm "in the moment". Having studied social dances in depth I understand that they are largely improvisational, using knowledge to compose on the spot.

In a way I feel that MAPP is asking me to become the "thinking body" and reflect on why and how I danced/performed/choreographed/directed the way I did, which feels like working at opposites ends of the spectrum. It's not difficult to identify areas of learning but identifying perhaps my most defining learning moments that have shaped and guided my artistic development. Sharing my process is also alien to me. So much of my work has been individualistic or delivered through other "receiving bodies". In this manner I haven't engaged dancers working with me into my creative thoughts too much. Perhaps because my creative process is in constant motion. Being "in the moment" means you're not using your mind but rather your intuition.
My challenge will be to formalize those creative sparks into a framework that is in itself divided into different compartments. That's where I can find my AOLs.