FULL NAME: Dayana Hristova

- PHONE NUMBER: 0043 677 616 08 654

- EMAIL: dayana.hristova@univie.ac.at

- SHORT BIOGRAPHY (400-500 characters) – relevant to the proposal, Symposium theme

Dayana Hristova has a background in dance, Cultural Anthropology and Cognitive science. She is a researcher at the “Embodied creativity in dyadic interaction” project of Michael Kimmel and a PhD student working on the “The dynamics of perceived difficulty in emotion regulation” (University of Vienna). She is a dancer and co-creator of art & science projects re-FLUX with Pompeu Fabra university, Barcelona (Spain), Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment and I No Mad together with the sound artist Dr. Colin Black (Australia). She uses multimedia, motion capture and robots as artistic means.

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- TITLE OF THE ACTIVITY: Making difficulty my friend

- DETAILED CONTENT DESCRIPTION (max. 2000 characters):

“no baby, if you’re going to create
[…]

you’re going to create with part of

your mind and your body blown away,
[…]

while the whole city trembles in earthquake,

bombardment, flood and fire.”

 Charles Bukowski, 2009 (1992)

“Air and light and time and space”  

Creating and learning despite or because (?) of the difficulties.

This workshop is built on the premise that everyone encounters difficulties in their life and artistic practice. Especially in turbulent times, the value of conceiving of difficulty as something positive becomes increasingly important. Hence, I propose reframing and embracing difficulty as a chance to learn, to grow and to get in touch with our most rudimental values, as a human/ a dancer/ a teacher. In this workshop, we will explore this process through studying how difficulty is stored in the body, as well as through looking at its creative potential for movement research and creative practice. In a sense, it is an attempt for Making difficulty my friend.

Among the main questions posed in this workshop are:

• How is difficulty stored in the body?
• Where can difficulty-inspired movement take me?
• How can dancing/ moving help dealing with difficulty?
• How can the perception of difficulty through dancing/ moving be adjusted?

Experimenting along those questions allows for working with difficulty in an embodied way using movement as a metaphor and main means of coping and emotion regulation practices. This workshop is based on my Cognitive science research on perceived difficulty put together with quasi-experimental practices from movement research. It aims to provide a space for reconciliation with one’s difficulties and challenges as most valuable teachers catalyzing and channeling one’s learning process.

[1] Bukowski, C. (2009). The last night of the earth poems. Harper Collins.

- SUMMARY OF CONTENT DESCRIPTION AND MOTIVATION (max 400- 500 characters; for publishing)

Making difficulty my friend  is an attempt to re-evaluate and embrace difficulty as a chance to learn, to grow and to get in touch with our most rudimental values, as a human/ a dancer/ a teacher. In this workshop, we will explore this process through studying how difficulty is stored in the body, as well as through looking at its creative potential for movement research and artistic practice. The aim is to provide a space for reconciliation with perceived difficulty as most valuable teacher catalyzing and channeling one’s learning process.

- SHORT BIOGRAPHY (max 60 words for publishing (if co-taught all in all max 60 words)

Dayana Hristova is a dancer, anthropologist and a PhD student in cognitive science at the University of Vienna. She researches on dyadic interaction in contact improvisation, tango and aikido, as well as on the perceived difficulty in emotion regulation. She is also a dancer and co-creator of art & science projects using multimedia, motion capture and robots as artistic means.

- GENERAL INTERESTS, CODE/KEY WORDS

embodiment, perceived difficulty, emotions, flow, dance

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- Participating requirements (for whom is this workshop for?) Any IDOCDE participant.

- TIME REQUIREMENTS (how much time do you need for sharing?) 1,5 – 2h

- SPACE REQUIREMENTS (what kind of space do you require for your sharing? studio size etc) Small to medium size studio (shouldn’t be too large).

- TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS (what kind of technical support do you require? audio, beamer etc) Audio system.

- OTHER REQUIREMENTS – comments. The studio should be relatively quite, meaning - no loud music from neighboring studios.