What moves you? Layers of allowing & the dances of this time.
10-17 August 2025 | Sunday – Sunday (8 days) | 10:30-17:00 | Amsterdam, NL
‘Never lie. Never say that something has moved you if you are still in
the same place’. – Jeanette Winterson
Lily Kiara draws from Skinner Releasing Technique (SRT), experiential anatomy & physiology, Biodynamic Craniosacral practice, Joged Amerta Movement (Suprapto Suryodarmo), Poetry and Instant Composition.
In 2024 we worked with ‘What moves you?’ as an overall guiding line. Throughout the year it had been returning in several ways in other workshops and situations as well. It seems to touch on important questions and skills in this time. I’d like to continue with this in 2025.
To which extent do we allow ourselves to be moved? What are ways of listening? Can you be in the place or space where you can be moved, without necessarily knowing what it is exactly that moves you? How can we practice letting ourselves be moved and observe and work with the forms that come?
What are the dances we make in this time, the stories, the poems? What do we respond to and how? What stimulates you to move, what to be still? How does it affect the shared dances? Shared by dancing together and shared by watching? What moves us and what do we move?
Time, space, story. What moves you in sense of space, in sense of time? What story do we make, what unfolds? Musicality, imagination, relationship. Listening in action. Fine tuning.
How do you relate to what moves you? Do you have a sense of choice? Or does it matter more to look at what comes from what moves us? What are the consequences for our dances?
‘We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to
have the life that is waiting for us.’ – Joseph Campbell
One day in this week we’ll work alternatively. This could mean working in silence and/or outside. It will probably be the 5th day (Thursday). A proposition will be offered when we’ve started practicing together.
images of the summer intensive 2024
Skinner Releasing Technique (SRT) supports the coming together of dance technique and the creative process simultaneously through the use of imagery, designed to enhance expansion and strength with efficiency and ease. Through practicing within different layers of consciousness, from eyes closed deeper in oneself (deeper imagery), in direct relation to space (movement studies), or in touch with another person (hands-on partner graphics), we can have different felt senses of moving and being moved. Tuning in and expanding. Practicing integrating inner and outer.
We’ll be making connections throughout the whole workshop between how we experience different principles in the dancing self and how we make dances. Being moved and making move. Practicing skills and embodying practices, using images. Then using the imagination to tune into the dances themselves coming into form.
This. Here. Now. Creating dances in the moment. What is the dance asking of you now? Can you listen to what this is and know it instantly through the dancing self? This also offers the possibility of ease: this moment contains and can reveal everything you need to know right now. Context supports this intuitive knowing and being with it. We practice technically and compositionally so there is an availability and readiness in this moment, in the body and in reading the composition as it unfolds and is being created. Being in touch with the possibility of being moved, to be able to stay up to date.
We include the practise and generosity of witnessing, watching and being watched, seeing and being seen. How does being seen support and affect our dance?
Biodynamic Craniosacral therapy is a gentle form of bodywork that originates from Osteopathic practice. It orientates to the Health and Intelligence of the body always being present in the client. Connecting with the more subtle layers in the self, dynamic stillness, listening and allowing are aspects of its orientation that resonate with approaches in SRT. The important role of presence is an example of its relevant relation to the practice of Improvisation.
Lily Kiara danced her first improvised performance on invitation of her dance teacher at the age of eight. She started her professional training at the School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam (1990-1994), at Bennington College and Movement Research in NYC. Further on, Skinner Releasing Technique (certified teacher since 2001), martial arts and training in instant composition with teachers such as Julyen Hamilton and Lisa Nelson have greatly influenced her work and evolving vision. The work of her late teacher Suprapto Suryodarmo, Joged Amerta, with whom she’s been practicing and performing in Indonesia, continues to inspire her on numerous levels. She has been making work for more than 30 years.
Since graduating in 2021 in London, she has been working as a Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapist. Lily also is active as a folk singer-songwriter, solo and with her bands The RIVER and The Tall Tales. She released several CDs and EPs on her own label Sibyl Sings and since 2016 on Zip Records.
Lily Kiara has been teaching classes and workshops in Skinner Releasing Technique and Creating Dances (Improvisation), sometimes together with a musician or lighting designer. She has been teaching at independent studios, festivals, academies and art institutions throughout Europe, USA, Australia and Indonesia and also guides artists in their process of making their own work.
You can wander through the website for further information and inspiration.
‘If you want to find your voice, you have to listen for it.’
-Margaret Atwood
FOR WHOM:
The Summer Intensive is being offered for the 23rd year in 2025 and is intended for more experienced dancers, movers, choreographers, mimers, actors, musicians etc. so we can (also) deepen and develop the work in the professional field. Experience can mean different things. Theatre director Peter Brook wrote about ‘skill and heart’ in relation to experience. If you are not sure but wish to join, please contact me through email. As it is an Intensive, it is not possible to come for single days.
WHEN:
10-17 August 2025 | Sunday – Sunday (8 days) | 10:30-17:00
COST:
€450
WHERE:
BAU Studio | large studio (directions below)
Entrepotdok 4
1018 AD Amsterdam
The Netherlands
ORGANISATION:
If you wish to join, please send an email. Deadline for signing up is Sunday 27 July. It is helpful if you confirm in time by payment or by staying in touch about it, otherwise you may loose your place or the workshop might be cancelled because i don’t know in time who is coming. If you are interested, please register in time and be clear about your participation and registration. It helps these independently set up workshops to be possible. It is very much appreciated! Thank you! Priority is given to participants who commit to coming for the whole workshop. Please send me a few lines about your previous experience. Details for further registration you can find below.
REGISTRATION:
To make your registration complete, you can please transfer €450 to the account below (incl. btw). If you cancel up until 10 days before the workshop, €75 administration costs will be kept. If you cancel after that, there can be no refund. You will receive an invoice soon after your payment. If the workshop is cancelled, you will get the full amount return. If you need other ways of payment, please let me know. If you just communicate about it in time, it is usually fine.
Account (please note the different name!):
Account name: A.M. Venendaal, Amsterdam, NL
IBAN: NL47 INGB 000 349 1465
BIC: INGBNL2A
LOCATION:
BAU Studio (large studio)
Entrepotdok 4
1018 AD Amsterdam
From Amsterdam CS a 15 minute walk or bus 22 in direction of Indische Buurt. Out at Kadijksplein (2nd stop). Walk underneath the arch with ‘Entrepot-Dok’ on it. The building is then on the left.
BAU studio and Lily Kiara are not to be held responsible for any physical injury or damage or loss of possessions during the workshop.
If you wish to be on my mailinglist for dance workshops, please send a message in e-mail.
You can also connect to this facebook page for dance workshops and classes
Thank you for your interest! Feel free to contact me if there might be any questions.
photo left by Lily | photo right by @arnaudbeelenphoto @tictacartcentre, Lily in: If only I could be here now