Title of the Lab: CI Philosophy

Date - time: 06.08.2018 15.30-16.30

Facilitator: Elske Seidel

Inquiriy of the lab:

What are you practicing?

Participants: 

Dorte Bjerre Jensen, Florian Busch, Bastien Auber, Alessandro Franceschelli, Konstantin Mihos, Anne-Gaelle Thiriot, Jordan Fuchs, Emily Bowman, Vera Mantero, Dilek Üstünalan, Patrick Gaiaudo, Barbara Stalberger, Otto Akkanen, Keith Henessey

Documentors: Dilek and whole group on big paper

Flow:

This lab was about questioning and discussing the relationship of CI with philosophy. Lab consisted of small group discussion, big group discussion, writing & drawing collectively, dancing and harvesting & writing-drawing- performing collectively in the end.

1) Elske: draw the question

2) Discussion in groups of 3 people - 10 min

We discussed around the questions "Is CI philosophy?", "What is the relationship of CI with philosophy? in groups of three or four. Here is the notes from one small group discussion:

Dilek, Keith and Vera - small group discussion notes

Is CI philosophy?

Questioning

Does dance create shared values?

System of thinking ... different philosophies

Practice of CI: study of the “thing” - then what is the “thing”?

Physicality

Is dancing it also questioning it?

So is it an embodied philosophical practice?

Can you dance without studying it?

If you use the dance for producing the outcome you miss what is happening / “the thing”.

3) Big group discussion and drawing or writing on big paper - 20 min

This big group discussion is about collection of ideas and material (from the small group discussions)

Elske suggested writing & drawing collectively on a big paper, as an aspect of listening  

- You can use colors to listen

- Drawing can come out of your sensation

Notes from big group discussion:

Anne Gaelle:

a big topic

How my notes evolved as we were speaking

Some constructions and some approaches of group

Speaking about asking questions, I imagine sth about them

Talking / asking, I start to develop an ongoing inquiry

Vera:

Beginning again, very recent doing sth I haven’t been doing for 20 years

Radical proximity

Seeing or perceiving otherwise other than sight which is very present in my society

Reverse of excluding and exclusion is also very present these days

ıt’s not sold

As I experienced for the first times, it was a very radical practice

How did this come from a white man?

Keith: Why is it so obvious that it came from a white man?

Vera: man or woman I don’t know but from US, New York.. ?

Keith: Didn’t it come from critical break of the whiteness, hippy culture?

Alessandro: Are there black people dancing contact?

Keith: They don’t want to call it contact because they don’t want to be identified with it. But they are in the jams.

West Africa and South Africa improvisors influenced by contact but they are not interested in a form

Is there a shared culture and if there is, what is it? Then this is not philosophy, it is culture

The study of the “thing”

Is dancing contact also the study of it - an embodied philosophical practice or embodied research?

Alessandro:

Which borders define the space that we can question?

Patrick:

Someone said in a lecture that philosophy is a coorporation of the practice 

we -- world -- the world that we can share in doing

Maybe CI philosophy is to practice what we are questioning

Alternative of some way of life

Is it sth we do for a long time and what we know, as other practices or we continue to invent new / alternative ways?

POC: People of Color Jam

QPOC: Queer people of color

Wccijam: West Coast Contact Improvisation Jam

Bastien:

philosophy is about wisdom; Wisdom I find in CI

Looking for meaning of life

Sensing of universe

They use philosophy, use mathematics and now we use contact to understand that big question

Where does it lead us?

I don’t feel comfortable in the lineament of ci philosophy

Dancing what is in the air - 18 min

After this big group discussion, we danced with "what is in the air". You can see the video below.

Then we came back and looked to the paper we created together; took the time for harvesting & writing & drawing - 6 min

This document is created based on the consent of all the participating teachers during the contactfestival freiburg Teachers Meeting 2018. 

If for some reason you (as one of the participants of this meeting) changed your mind and wish some or all parts of this document not to be published, please contact defne.erdur@idocde.net.