Workshop Dance
07.10 – 11.10.2024
14:00 – 18:00
UMA WestPark
Studio A
Open Workshop
To register : info@urbanmoveacademy.ch / 022 980 99 95
Pau Aran Gimeno (Barcelona, 1981) is a Dance Artist now based in Germany and Spain. He came to dance at the age of eleven and soon studied all styles: Latin American, Standard, Jazz, Modern and Classical Ballet. He completed his studies at the Conservatorio Profesional de Danza ‘Mariemma’ in Madrid and later at the Folkwang Hochschule der Künste in Essen, before joining the ensemble of the Tanztheater Wuppertal – Pina Bausch in 2005, until 2020 as a permanent member and later as a guest.
Since 2013, and in parallel to his career as a dancer, Pau has been creating his own pieces and presenting his work in Germany, France, Italy, Chile, Spain and Japan. In 2020, he began his artistic collaboration with Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui which continues to this day. Pau has also danced for other choreographers such as Theo Clinkard, Alan Lucien Øyen, Antonio Ruz, Stefan Jovanović and Jorge Puerta Armenta.
His current motivation is to continue developing the expression of his art through body language, focusing on the creation and pedagogy of contemporary dance. The search for beauty, movement and his interest in the poetics of contemporary dance theater are represented in his projects. With a commitment to share previously gained knowledge and experiences to the next generation of artists, Pau simultaneously encourages self-discovery in his students and collaborators. Combining the passage of time and transient nature of dance, fusing heritage and tradition, with the future.
Workshop refers to my pedagogical proposal, which comes from a long career as a professional dancer and as an independent creator.
It also honors the studio as a place of experimentation and craft creation. For me, the dance studio is like a workshop where we learn, practice and improve our technique / crafts(wo)manship in order to find a creative identity.
As I have observed new generations of dancers in my teaching and performance experience, I have realized that new performers are changing their relationship to the body and the motivations that drive their movement.
My passion is simple but complex. To keep developing and deepening my perception of the world, and to fine tune its physical expression through my own body and in collaboration with others. I have been accumulating knowledge from artists such as Pina Bausch, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, Malou Airaudo, Cristiane Boullosa, Dominique Mercy and Francesc Bravo – to name a few. It is now my goal, as a teaching artist, to transmit this wide range of experiences to future generations of dancers.
This is why I search for diverse and frequent encounters with artists in dance and movement, to find new forms of communication with each other. By creating and developing a shared physical language, we start to question what we can do individually and collectively and how this can contribute to a more coherent and sustainable society. A unit.
My desire is never to cling to what I know, but to find new ways to communicate what I have learned and add a spark of myself to future artists.
My goal is to maintain a connection between Western dance techniques, which continue to shape contemporary dance today, and simultaneously further my development of my work as a dance facilitator. I will continue to explore my pedagogical and choreographic methods to bring them into a mutual exchange all over the world.
TECHNIQUE, COMPOSITION AND MOVEMENT RESEARCH
In my methodology, I propose a work based on compositional factors of dance, according to the dancer, choreographer and pedagogue Jean Cébron (1927-2019): Energy, Form, Space and Rhythm.
The Jooss-Leeder method inspires much of my class. Respecting the different needs and circumstances of the group, I focus on breathing, repetition and opposing directional forces. At the end of the training, we conclude with a sequence containing the information studied during the session.
Afterwards, composition and improvisation exercises open a dialogue with each performer in the space. I seek to connect them with their unique personal expression and their creative potential which is often beyond their physical aptitudes. With these premises, there will be work and room through play and pleasure. Dancers are asked to study with detail: movement – both visceral and gestural, writing, improvisation and body narratives. Participants will connect with authenticity but also confront their insecurities and develop a greater awareness of their limits in order to overcome them.
Thus, through guidelines and keywords, the group will explore a resilient, open and autonomous way of thinking about creativity. An invitation to self-reliance, but also to a collective process of discovery, questioning and expansion.
