Christine Bruno At May 13th's New York Posse Meeting

New York Posse member Christine Bruno:
I know I had a breakthrough last week and really want to keep investigating with our posse and work toward a plan that keeps me on track between our meetings.
I have been realizing the past few months - especially at last week's meeting - that I need to make this work a priority NOW!
Note from Tamar:
Christine was working with Gregg and Shawn Shafner, our newest Posse member from the dance community. They had her focusing and investigating her shin and calf muscles and how it is to instigate a new walk from in between those places.
Sometimes, a brand new focus can break through a habitual pattern and in that moment of newness, the brain seems to figure something out. Christine, as an actor, has mastered the power of concentration.
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Fauns on Film

I hope you all are enjoying this beautiful weekend day and are getting out into this Spring air a bit, because it sure is nice out there right now. Or it was until I came back inside.

 

I wanted to share an idea that we've got kicking around  for the continued outreach efforts around Enter The Faun.

 

Enter The Faun premiered a few weeks ago at the Sarasota Film Festival and it was very well received. People loved it. In addition to that however, Tamar Rogoff and I did several workshops bringing together members of the dance and disability community down there, and it was phenomenal. We met and worked with over 100 people (abled/disabled, dancers/non-dancers), and are currently in talks with them to continue this work and develop a dedicated program a la Mark Morris's Dance for PD program.

 

There's an incredible alchemy in bringing these two communities together, and we think it can be a real model for effecting change. Dancers may have more consciously learned movement patterns than any other profession. Among the many forms and techniques of dance there are often conflicting instructions, and the dancer must translate these ideas into movement and artistry. People with CP may understand negotiating conflicting instructions and integrating them into movement better than most people. Both have a unique relationship and knowledge of the body. Dance is a performing art built upon the ebb and flow of muscular tension. Through muscular tension, dancers express their aesthetic sensibilities. The word "dance," in fact, stems from the Old High German "danson," meaning to stretch, and from the earlier Sanskrit root "tan," meaning tension. The building and resolution of tensions we experience in dance training and performance can affect us deeply -- kinesthetically, emotionally, and spiritually.

 

We had one of our posse meetings here in New York last Monday, and began to integrate dancers from the Hunter Grad program, where we collaborated on a project with the Posse last Fall. This set up just feels right. We believe there can be no limit to what can occur through this exchange of ideas and work with the body.

As our experiment continues we now are asking ourselves two new questions; why can't physical therapy be an exploration of movement in its purest and myriad forms? Why can't it contain artistry? We feel we can model for this potential "Dance for CP Program" (working title) with the connections we have made here in NYC and now in Sarasota to see how this develops. New posses are developing and expanding all the time. We're still figuring this out, but we know this is the direction we want to go in.

We'll keep you posted and look forward to sharing more of what we find.

Gregg