Page 14 RAIN April 1979 Ross Chapin and Remy Aqui brought Contact improvisation to Rain last autumn. Learning about this new form of body movement in which people communicate through the natural laws governing motion-gravity, momentum, inertia-was like discovering for the first time something you 've known all along. Contact feels right. Ross, an architect by training, synthesizes for us here some thoughts on the Contact experience, and how it can be used as a learning model to facilitate greater clarity and connectedness in our many separate roles and responsibilities. -SA Dancing Our Lives Contact Improvisation works on physical, intuitive and mythical levels, restructuring our overly rational/intellectual viewpoint. I sense that it can help many of us understand and transcend the psychological blocks that we've learned unwillingly in our lives. Contact Improvisation is a movement which arises out of the point of contact between two or more people and their environment. Thus its name. It can include rolling, falling, being upside down, supporting and giving weight to a partner, or merely touching. The improvisors are ordinary people, in practice clothes, and most often work in a room with wood floors that is large enough to run in. They make it known that their form is not to be classified with traditional forms of dance in our culture. It has a "form," yet its emphasis is on the energy flow between people; a focus on the poi nts of communication and sensitivity. The dance grows from the meeting, lives in the moment, and lets go, moving on to the next possibility . Its overall effect is something like the martial arts, wrestling, rough-housing, tumbling, jitterbugging, or even lovemaking. Profoundly intimate, it is not overtly sexual or romantic. The calf of one's leg nuzzles the neck of another; an elbow contacts a thigh. The participants explore balances, finding new ways to support and give weight to each other. One partner may jump into the air and land on the shoulder or hip of another, while the receiving partner accepts the weight by folding, rolling, or sometimes melting with it. Each is challenged to be open, soft and trusting. With extraordinary attention, Contactors explore human interdependence. Contact Improvisation is as affirming as any activity can be: anybody that can move can do it. Eleaner Luger (Christopher Street, 5178) commented after taking a workshop : ] > :. go ... :l u c o ~ " ~ ~ ~ u ~ o __ ~ > ~~~~~~~~~ __ ~~~~~~~~~~====~:JI ~ &Cooperf!.tion by Ross Chapin Contact ENERGY Citizens Energy Packet, Mark Levy, 1978,32 pp., from: CENYC 51 Chambers Street, Rm. 228 New York, NY 10007 For people in New York city who want to start taking action directly in their homes and communities to conserve energy, this packet is a very good starting place. Where to go for weatherization, recycling, technical solar and wind information, and more-done on a community level. Write for publications list. - LS Oregon's Energy Future, Third Annual Report, Oregon Department of Energy, 1979, 122 pp., plus appendix, free from: Oregon Department of Energy Room 111, Labor and Industries Bldg. Salem, OR 97310 Attn : publications request The trim size, easy readability and reliable data of Oregon DOE's Third Annual Report make it a welcome relief in the vast sea of bureaucratic epiC9: that are afloat. What makes it exceptional is its serious recognition of renewable energy sources- wind, biomass, geothermal, direct solar and conservation-in augmenting the state's energy needs and bypassing thc fossil fuel deadlock. By independently forecasting lower demand it also counters the expanded projections being used by private electric utilities to rationalize rapid energy growth and the building of new thermal power plants. Other not so obvious issues are considered herein, such as fuel switching, or the use of one fuel where previously another fuel had been used. For instance, if people switch from oil to electricity for home heating and that electricity is generated by thermal plants, then even though final energy demand remains constant, the primary demand for energy increases, seriously affecting the state's conservation efforts. Despite some obvious Iimi tations, th is rep ort is a solid example for other state energy offices and a useful workbook for people involved in creating Oregon's energy future. - Andy Konigsberg/SA
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NTc4NTAz