MY STORY
Early years:
I was born in Perth to a bohemian mother and dentist father. My mother had a lifelong interest in dance, theatre and music. In the 1947 she saw Ted Shawn dance, one of the great pioneers of Modern Dance and the originator of the now famous Jacob’s Pillow. He came to Australia through the invitation of Ida Beeby who was director of Patch Theatre in Perth. My father excelled in athletics and taught me from a young age to value different cultures through their food and belief systems. He saw Pavlova dance at His Majesty’s Theatre in Perth. In my family the body was celebrated for its strength, beauty and aesthetic. Growing up in the Western Australian climate and environment encourages a physical life. I loved swimming in the ocean and camping under the stars.
I began learning ballet when I was 7 years old from Madame Kira Bousloff. She was a dancer with Colonel de Basil’s Russian Ballet. The company was touring Australia at the outbreak of WWII and along with other dancers in the company, she chose to remain in Australia, eventually opening a ballet school in Perth in the early 1950’s. Kira Bousloff also founded the West Australian Ballet Company, creating many ballets with the composer James Penberthy.
Her teaching continues to influence my life as a dance artist. She had studied in Paris with the great Russian Ballerina Olga Preobrajenska, from the Mariinsky Theatre, St Petersburg. Preobajenska escaped to Paris during the Russian Revolution. Each class with Kira was made up as she went, developing a lifetime skill in picking up material quickly and setting the ground for my interest in improvisation. Kira’s accent, cigarette smoking and favouritisms being absorbed along with technique and repertoire, contributing to a life-long yearning for the Euro-centric life which I feel I only broke on my recent trip to Europe. The environment she created stimulated the discovery of ideas, movement and life. Her choreography had a commitment to place and local culture. She made work about the particular landscape of Western Australia, collaborating with local musicians and artists to realize her choreography. Studying with Kira exposed me other cultures and other countries. As well as Kira my teachers were Gundi Sobkowiak from Vienna and Kiril Vassilkovsky, born in Riga to Russian parents. They were both dance artists who had arrived in Australia after WWII and who brought a wealth of experience and more than a whiff of other worlds. All of my teachers imbued me with the sense of what it might be to be an artist and live a creative life – to craft a life around my passion for dance.
The Studio was a place of different realities and the tram and later bus journey to ballet class each Saturday was my first experience of an independent moving life. I filled my little body, learning the pleasure of precise physical exertion, the discipline of working with others and experiencing the rare transcendent moments when a difficult sequence is mastered. My imagination was stimulated and my intellect enlivened. The studio was a place inhabited by a world of strong women. I modelled my emergent feminine on these women as much as my familial line.
At sixteen I became the youngest member of Robert Pomie’s company and performed in a season of work at His Majesty’s Theatre, Perth. I also performed with the WA Ballet Company in the Festival of Perth, 1967. Between 1965 – 68 I worked as a professional dancer in the Playhouse Theatre Company’s yearly Pantomime and as a member of the Old Time Music Hall Company in Perth and Fremantle. These experiences taught me about the rigour of performing and the professional attitude needed to do this every night for months. I continued studying and performing until the birth of my three children in the 1970’s.
Becoming a parent:
I had 3 children in my early 20’s and for nearly 10 years my dancing paused. However, with the birth of my first child I began to learn to teach. By the time my second and third child was born I was living between Perth and the south-west of Western Australia before settling in Roleystone with my young family. The next few years were spent parenting and learning to garden. I didn’t dance again until my third child was four years old. Then I resumed class once a week and choreographed, danced and performed in local theatre productions. This pause in my career introduced other dimensions to my life. I learnt to observe, to cook, to compose a garden of 1.5 acres, to create a home and to love my children. My second son was born with disabilities and this began a life journey in understanding Developmental Movement and brain patterning, contributing to my curiosity about the bodymind and the meaning of health in our culture. His journey became my journey and it is to my son John that I owe the debt of living with difference … how to do this and remain creative. Each of my children deepened my experience of life and challenged my perceptions of what it is to live a creative life and to live in the present moment.
The 1980’s:
In 1981 I resumed my studies as one of the inaugural intake of students at the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA). Reyes de Lara and Jean Tally were initially my teachers and later my colleagues. Lucette Aldous and Noelle Shader were my Classical Ballet teachers. I graduated in 1983, and in the same year began performing with the now professional WA Ballet Company, under the artistic direction of Barry Moreland. Over the next twelve years I was a regular guest artist creating roles in Moreland’s Romeo and Juliet, Alice in Wonderland and Cinderella. A highlight for me was Lady Capulet opposite Alan Alder’s Lord Capulet in Romeo and Juliet. I also performed the role of the mother in Giselle under the direction of Dame Beryl Grey in her production for the company.
In 1984 I became an original member of Still Moves Dance Laboratory under the artistic direction of Reyes de Lara. Still Moves was a post-modern dance company committed to collaborative dance-making and New Dance practices. Performing and creating post-modern dance works with Still Moves, at the same time as performing with the WA Ballet Company, was an interesting and slippery combination that continues to inform me as an artist. As a member of Still Moves (1984-1989), I performed, made work, taught in different contexts within the community and began to develop my own practice and pedagogical approach.
In 1985, after intensive workshops in Melbourne with Lisa Nelson, Dana Reitz and Steve Paxton, improvisation and its inherent practices and philosophies began to influence my dance practice. As co-editor of Contact Quarterly (CQ), Lisa Nelson introduced me to the work of Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. She gave me CQ’s first article on Body-Mind Centering. I felt almost immediately that this was going to be my next area of study.
In 1985 I also began teaching at WAAPA, and introduced Contact Improvisation to Theatre students.
In 1987, at the invitation of new music composer, Kenneth Gaburo, I made my first trip to the Unites States. I spent 4 weeks working with composer and visual artist, Catherine Schieve who is a colleague today living in Australia.
The thinking body:
The shift from classical to post-modern was aligned with my engagement in feminism, politics and social change. I was separating myself from the idealized, romantic ballet dancer for the more ‘real’ contemporary dancer/woman – strong body, bare feet, wearing everyday clothes. Goodbye little princess! I wanted to realize change in the world through how the body was performed and seen. I was also outraged at how women’s bodies have been appropriated by phallocentricism. My dancing needed to relate to my life. Being a single parent and an artist with three young children was challenging. Post-modern dance practices and philosophies satisfied my curiosity about the moving body and provided inspiration for my inquiring mind. I was hooked!
This initial antagonism of Classical and Post-Modern has been resolved for me by acknowledging their lineage to each other and in finding my own ‘voice’ in the artform – a voice that has been formed and influenced by both techniques and philosophies. I recognize that they can inform and influence each other in my dancing. I continue to ‘play’ with this in my practice – allowing my classical to subvert the post-modern and visa versa. As an improviser this has been a place of inquiry and a point of interest rather than an editing out. Now I am curious how all these techniques and histories intersect in my dancing. I can experience the whole range without needing to censor one or the other. I honour the connection and lineage of these techniques and dance forms. No longer needing to censor my ballet training – I delight in the histories that emerge in my dancing body.
Contact Improvisation and New Dance practices began a dialogue within me that continues today. They established the basis for my current research into improvisation and performance making. The questions and inquiries surrounding and emerging from these practices have opened conversations regarding contemporary life. My interest and research has given me wonderful opportunities to work with great artists like Nancy Stark-Smith, Julyen Hamilton, Lisa Nelson and Steve Paxton. These artists continue to influence my approach to living a creative life.
1990’s:
In 1990, with the support of Tony Osborne, who was my life partner and performance collaborator, I opened a studio in Northbridge Perth. For ten years I created performances, developing my teaching style and pedagogy in relationship to the ideas stimulated in the creative process. I taught Contact Improvisation, Improvisation & Performance, Alignment & Locomotion and Body-Mind Centering®. I opened my workshops to people from diverse backgrounds and this community continues to the present, with people who have worked with me for nearly twenty years. I have become a mentor to a generation of Australian dance and performing artists.
During this time, 1990-1999, I collaborated with artists from different art forms creating My Ersatz Heart with writer Terri-ann White; No Fixed Point with Tony Osborne; Shifting Surfaces with writer Christine Owen; Art, Medicine and the Body with visual artist Michele Theunissen; Working with the Interface with musicians Ross Bolleter and Rob Muir. I also created several solo works: Home Husband 8 Children What More Could A Woman Want? (this work was also filmed and documented by film-maker Mitzi Goldman); Lullaby; falling from grace; mobius loop; and light moments. I performed regularly at the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA) under the direction of Sarah Miller. I also performed Lullaby in Launceston, Melbourne and Sydney.
Over these ten years Tony Osborne and myself developed a community interested in our work and post-modern performance practices. Both of us created solo and collaborative performance work from the studio that was performed at Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA), Subiaco Theatre Centre and the Blue Room Theatre. The social, political and racial questioning that was infusing Australian culture during the 80’s and early 90’s was reflected in the arts. A period of innovation, risk and collaboration was encouraged.
In 1993 Tony and I undertook an extended period of study and professional development in the United States, Italy and the Netherlands, studying with Nancy Stark Smith, Julyen Hamilton, Christina Svane, Vera Schlenker, Patricia Bardi and Katie Duck. We returned to Perth renewed and inspired. Between 1993-97 I taught experiential anatomy, movement, and improvisation in the Theatre Department at Murdoch University at the invitation of Rachel Fensham. Rachel’s history in dance and performance-making in Melbourne paralleled some of my interests and she created a course that pursued an embodied approach to theatre and performance making.
In 1994 Ric McCracken, the trade union arts officer and myself initiated a dance in working life project, funded by the Australia Council. I was involved in setting up and teaching workshops in the workplace for the Public Sector Union. Photographer Chris Ha, visual artist Wendy Herrington and writer Christine Owen documented the work. The Community Arts Board of the Australia Council commissioned a report, and this was later published in Australia and the United States.
From 1995-98, with an Independent Study Grant from the Australia Council, I studied Body-Mind Centering® at the School for Body-Mind Centering, with Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen in the United States. Meeting and studying with artists from Europe and the United States was invigorating. Whilst I felt increasingly marginalised with my work in Perth I felt deeper connections globally that sustained me. Body-Mind Centering® is now central to my ongoing research and practice.
Sydney and new beginnings:
At the end of 1999 Tony and I moved to Sydney. We had both found colleagues to work with in Sydney and Melbourne and we found the culture of Perth conservative. We needed to take more risks and have an adventure.
During my five years in Sydney my colleagues were Nikki Heywood, Victoria Spence, Sue-Ellen Kohler and Kimberley McIntyre. These mature performance artists all supported my new life. As mid-career artists we were all making changes to accommodate children, relationships and the necessity to earn a living. Our performance training has taken us into other fields of endeavour. Sue-Ellen is one of Australia’s most respected Iyengar yoga teachers; Victoria has become a celebrant with a keen interest in the human acts of living and dying; Kimberley has become a mother and Nikki Heywood is a Doctoral candidate continuing her research into theatre and performance making. These women all continue to inspire and enrich my life.
At this time I also taught and performed with Ros Crisp, Helen Clarke-Lapin and musician/composer Ion Pearce. I also performed solo work at Dancehouse in Melbourne and The Performance Space in Sydney.
Whilst forming a community around my regular weekly BMC and Performance classes, I also extended my teaching practice in new directions through the interest of somatic psychotherapists, yoga practitioners and Pilates teachers. I continued to return to Perth several times a year to teach intensive workshops.
Melbourne:
In 2005 I moved to Melbourne where I completed a Master of Arts at Victoria University in 2008. The Masters comprised a performance and thesis: hear her breathe: a rhapsody of gravity, space and the body.
The same year I was invited to teach for Ricochet Dance Company in London. This was an opportunity to teach professional dancers who had a commitment to somatic practice as a part of their ongoing professional development. The artistic director Karin Fisher-Potisk had also done the BMC training and it was exciting to see my approach to BMC and improvisation realized with these artists.
In 2009 I was visiting Professor of Dance at Denison University, Ohio. Along with my teaching duties I involved myself with the Theatre department and performed alongside two of my colleagues in Samuel Beckett’s Come and Go. At the University I had the privilege of working with cellist and vocalist Bob Een, who had been a collaborator with Meredith Monk. Before returning home I had a wonderful experience co-creating a solo work, with Rose-Anne Spradlin in New York City. I was living in the East Village and spending every day in the studio. Rose-Anne had been one of my BMC teachers and was a recent Guggenheim recipient. Together we developed a work alicec, which I performed at her studio in West Broadway.
Over the past five years I have been teaching my regular workshops at Dancehouse and Cecil Street Studio. From 2007-2010 I taught in Darwin, Hobart, Canberra, Perth, Sydney and Melbourne. Through my work around Australia I have created a diverse community engaged with my teaching practice. I continue to return to Perth and Sydney several times a year to teach intensive workshops. Over the last decade this has created a strong community of people who have immersed themselves in the study of BMC and somatic integration as well as my approach to performance and improvisation.
In Melbourne I have enjoyed a rich, playful and erudite practice with Al Wunder, the grandfather of improvisation in Australia. I first studied with Al in the early 1990’s and it has been a delight to renew my collaboration and friendship with him since living in Victoria. We performed our Silent Movies: a man and a woman on a monthly basis. I also collaborate with poet Ashley Higgs and musician Forbes Hawkins, creating performances across spoken word, dance, voice and piano. In 2009 I collaborated with musician/composer Anita Hustas in: Where Our Edges Meet, part of the Earobics Project at Dancehouse. This was the beginning of what we both hope is a continuing collaboration. I have been a regular guest of The Little Con, performing solo and group improvisations. In recent years I have also performed in Sydney’s Whip It, renewing connection with old friends and meeting new dance artists.
The next decade:
I am thrilled to be creating a studio and retreat at Riddells Creek for the transmission of my work. It is a place of great beauty, intimacy and potential. We hope people will come from all over the world to dance, make work, write and dream. It is a place for moving research …
The first workshop/retreat is in October and it was booked out within 10 days! The news has started to filter out into the world and I have had emails from the UK and the US. Wow! We have begun … what next?
Publications
This Body is Enough Speaking, with Fiona Maclean, Contact Quarterly Vol 28 No 2, Mass. USA 2003
Moving Meanings with Christine Owen in “Dancers and Communities”, Australia 1997
Moving Meanings with Christine Owen Contact Quarterly Vol 20 No 1, Mass. USA 1995