Somatic Performance Practices: Sandra Reeve and Ecological Movement

Somatic Performance Practices: Sandra Reeve and Ecological Movement By: Dr Emma Meehan

This project investigated the attention to physical, social and political context in somatic performance practices, focusing on the work of practitioner Dr. Sandra Reeve and her ‘ecological movement’ approach as a case study. The umbrella term ‘somatic practices’ has been used to describe movement forms that emphasise body-mind integration, attention to subjective experience, the agency of the subject in developing his/her own movement and reflection on movement patterns.

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"Ecological Movement"

A core strand of Reeve’s training and performance work focuses on ‘ecological movement’ which considers the performer’s and audience's inter-relationship with the context of the work. This ingrains site as an integral part of the performance and raises wider social and political issues about the interdependence of humans and the surrounding ecology. This research is pertinent due to the rapid expansion of somatic practices in performance, with a need for research into specific approaches as case studies in order to reflect on key elements and core principles of somatic practices in performance.

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Questions:

What does this attention to context in somatic practices have to offer the wider field of performance, and more specifically, to political performance which deals with physical and social ecological issues?

Can attention to the physical location and social context in Reeve’s work provide a model for the ethical relationship between people and the places they inhabit as an ecological sphere of interdependence, beyond a momentary engagement during training or performances?

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Project Objectives

The aims of the research include:

Developing a UK case study on somatic practices in performance
Drawing out information on ‘context’ as an aspect of somatic practices in performance
Addressing the socio-political and ecological aspects of somatic practices through Reeve as a case study
Highlighting theatre as an underrepresented aspect of somatic performance practices
Understanding the impact of non-Western practices on somatic performance practices and how they are adapted to UK settings.

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Context:

In preparation for the retreat I undertook field visits at Dorset, UK, and Sligo, Ireland to undertake interviews and participant observation of Sandra Reeve’s workshops and open days; and her teacher Suprapto Suryodarmo’s work; as well as attending a performance in London. I also organized an artist retreat to test the research questions in another context – the urban landscape of Coventry. Data was gathered through field notes, transcribed interviews, images, video, questionnaires, social media and so on. Library based research included examination of theories of materiality, somatic studies and digital cultures to examine emerging themes of interest.

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Writing Alongside- Blog

For more insight into the 5 days please visit the blog.

Click on link below.

http://writingalongside.ning.com/profiles/blog/list

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Research Impact

Pathways to Impact included an artist’s retreat, which was free to attend, to reach out to communities who might not otherwise have access to the research, including the professional dance and theatre community. The retreat shared the research ideas in practical formats, to make the research freely available to a wider community and expand industry applications. There was also a final day practice-based sharing the work with a public audience. Reflections have been gathered from professional practitioners and audience members, to document if/how the research has transformed creative practice and perspectives on the city. Partners Decoda and City Arcadia also engaged with the project by discussing the work of other professional artists who have worked in the city of Coventry, to create continuity between past and present arts projects in the city. I have documented the research process through collecting writings, photographs, video and other media, to be shared on the website and social media.

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Project details

FUNDER

Coventry University

COLLABORATORS

Partners Decoda and City Arcadia

PROJECT TEAM

Emma Meehan (PI), Rebecca Stancliffe (impact) and Lily Hayward-Smith (admin, marketing and images).

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Dr. Emma Meehan

[Organiser] Dr. Emma Meehan is a Research Fellow at Coventry University’s Centre for Dance Research (C-DaRE). She received her BA and PhD from the Drama Department, Trinity College Dublin, where she taught part-time. She recently published the co-edited collection Through the Virtual Towards the Real: The Performing Subject in the Space of Technology with Matthew Causey and Neill O’Dwyer (Palgrave, 2015). Articles include: “The Autobiographical Body” in Nine Ways of Seeing a Body, Volume II, edited by Sandra Reeve, Axminster: Triarchy Press, 2013; and “Visuality, Discipline and Somatic Practices: The Maya Lila Performances of Joan Davis”, in The Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices, Intellect Press, Volume 2, Number 2, 2010. "Speak: Authentic Movement, 'Embodied Text’ and Performance as Research" in The Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices, Intellect Press, Volume 7, Number 1 (2015). She is a co-convenor of the Performance as Research working group at the International Federation for Theatre Research and associate editor for the Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices.

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Contact details

For further information, please contact Emma Meehan, Project Organiser, at ab4488@coventry.ac.uk; alternatively contact Rebecca Stancliffe, Impact Officer, at stanclir@uni.coventry.ac.uk.

Sandra Reeve is an interdisciplinary artist working in dance, theatre, intercultural studies and ecological studies. Reeve is also a scholar, having completed a PhD in Performance Practice at the Drama Department, University of Exeter, where she is an Honorary Fellow. Reeve has published Nine Ways of Seeing a Body (2011) and the edited collection Ways of Seeing a Body: Body and Performance (2013).

Decoda is the organisation that has grown from the Summer Dancing festivals, initiated in 2007 by Katye Coe. It is an artist led project based in the West Midlands with an international reach. Decoda creates spaces for conversation, practice and community, offers residencies and curates workshop series, festivals and performance events.

City Arcadia is a two-year (June 2014-2016) programme of creative commissions responding to the past, present and imagined future of Coventry city centre with Artspace, Coventry. It invites people to collaborate on a series of commissioned ‘propositions’ that celebrate Coventry as a historical test bed for new ideas and innovations and consider the Modernist architectural vision of Coventry’s post-war centre; building a futuristic city that cultivates “the total, harmonious, physical, spiritual and intellectual wellbeing of a city’s inhabitants“.

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