S1 Ep35 Dance Workshop (Reformulation: Why Dance?)

In this workshop, we explore the question “Why dance?” by deliberately moving away from movement and finding our way back to it through a chain of material transformations.

Starting with five minutes of automatic writing, we select five words, translate them into everyday objects, compose those objects into a sculpture, transform that composition into bodily positions, draw those positions, invent and describe a creature from the drawing, create a costume for it, record a movement video, meditate with the image, and finally return to writing. Each step reformulates what came before into a different medium—without needing to know why or where the process is heading.

Through this sequence, we explore what follows us between materials, what gets lost or carried across, and how dance can emerge through text, objects, drawing, fabric, sensation, and imagination. The workshop asks what happens when we stop looking for the next logical step and instead allow unexpected reformulations to guide the practice.

Ultimately, it is an inquiry into the materiality of dance, expression, and the conceptual containers different forms create for us—and a playful attempt to discover why we return to dance at all.

Reference: ♻ The Reformulation Handbook (2013) — Download

Questions Explored:

• What is the materiality of dance if its expression can happen through so many different mediums?

• What stays with us when we reformulate something across different materials?

• How can unexpected reformulations free us from our own expectations?

• How do different forms, text, objects, drawings, costumes, act as containers for understanding our dance?

• What happens when we use scores and instructions to surprise ourselves rather than reach a predetermined result?

• Why do we return to dance at all?