WORKSHOP
Reclaiming the Metamorphic Imagination: An Ecosomatic Workshop on ‘Passages’
With Raffaele Rufo (PhD)
Presented at EKSUS Performing Arts Center, Helsinki
Kaasutehtaankatu 1/33, rakennus nro 6, 2. krs, Puhdistamo, Suvilahti
Tuesday 29th March, h10-13pm (EET, UTC +02:00)
Event free of charge. Register here: https://forms.gle/GQvpv6WfxCgRwnxz7
The workshop is part of the initiatives celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Other Spaces Finnish Arts Collective (“Toisissa Tiloissa”)
Workshop description
In this outdoor/indoor workshop we engage with a range of ecosomatic tools and processes of sensory attunement, movement improvisation and choreographic embodiment to explore the relation between place and passage and the creation of ‘gateways’ between matter and the imagination. The workshop materials have been developed by Raffaele Rufo drawing on over twenty years of experience in different practices - Contact Improvisation, Body Weather, Feldenkrais, theatre training, body-phenomenology, deep ecology, biological gardening, the Tango dance and other forms of social dance. In a world where roots are as deeply needed as out of reach, participants are invited to engage in the act of returning as ‘a ritual of passage’ in which the object of return and the mode of return are both transformed. Ecosomatic practice is proposed as a process of remembering a more-than-human reciprocity through durational and multisensory entanglements which extend the ritualisation of time and space to the grieving for ecological disasters and the prospects for repair.
Instructions for participants
Please come in comfortable clothing appropriate to the weather (if possible water resistant and neutral colours: e.g., grey, brown, black, green or khaki). Bring a bottle of drinking water, a snack, and a notebook with a pen for documentation. The workshop includes a walk to the Mustikkamaa outdoor recreation area (island), about 1 km from Eskus, which is a forest and seaside.
In preparation for the workshop, participants are invited to collect and bring with them a materic object - a gift - which embodies the memory of their connection with land, sea or waterways. This can be any vegetal, mineral or animal form of vibrant matter: pieces of bark, feathers, pebbles, seashells, cob cores, pine cones, dried flowers, leaves, twigs, seeds...In reaching out towards this gift, participants are invited to consider three questions: Where is home? Where can you find nature? Where do you feel your roots are?
To support the co-creation of a ‘ritual of return’, we need an old metal bucket with a handle, a big metal water bowl, and a wall clock. Participants are kindly invited to coordinate among themselves to provide these. Participants are also invited to coordinate among themselves to identify a song about home/place/roots that they may all know, a simple traditional song in their native language.
Video links
‘Passaggi’ - Ecosomatic Methodology in Dance and Performance Practice https://vimeo.com/1012363891
Tree Funeral - Ecosomatic Workshop https://vimeo.com/1019796411
Short bio Raffaele Rufo
Raffaele Rufo (PhD) is a somatic dance practitioner, a facilitator of artistic and cultural processes, and an independent scholar committed to community and land regeneration. His artistic background is entwined with the Australian ensemble ‘Liminal Theatre and Performance’, with body-phenomenology and with the Argentine Tango dance, which he later combined with Contact Improvisation, Body Weather, the Felndenkrais method of somatic movement, deep ecology and biological gardening. After focusing his performance practice on Melbourne’s public urban spaces, Raffaele has explored the questions of roots and exile in Milan and Rome through the ecosomatic relation with the nonhuman and matter. His ongoing and recent creative projects include ‘Rituali di Pa(e)ssaggio’, ‘Danced by the Tree’, ‘Return of the Centaurs’, ‘Ecokinetics’ and ‘Ecosomatic Persephone’. He is co-founder of the International Forum for Eco-Embodied Arts (IFEEA) and collaborates with Teatro del Lido di Ostia as artistic director of ‘La Selva’ Ecosomatic Residency. Raffaele holds a PhD in dance and performance and his research has been published in academic journals and book collections. www.raffaelerufo.com
References
Rufo, Raffaele & Gallo, Flavia (2024, forthcoming), ‘Reclaiming the Metamorphic Imagination: Ecosomatic Practice and the Poetics of Myth in the Age of Ecological Disaster,’ Culture Teatrali vol. 33.
Rufo, Raffaele (2024), ‘Somatic Arts and Liveable Futures. Embodying Ecological Connections’, Lagoonscapes. The Venice Journal of Environmental Humanities vol. 4(1), pp. 199-218, http://doi.org/10.30687/LGSP/2785-2709/2024/01/010.
Rufo, Raffaele (2023), ‘Humans, Trees, and the Intimacy of Movement: An Encounter with Eco-Somatic Practice,’ European Journal of Ecological Psychology, vol. 8, pp. 88-113, Special Issue on ‘Embodiment and Ecopsychology’, http://ecopsychology-journal.eu/index.php.
Rufo, Raffaele (2022), ‘Sensing with Trees: Explorations in the Reciprocity of Perception’, Venti Journal: Air, Experience, Aesthetics, vol. 2(2), https://www.venti-journal.com/Raffaele-rufo.