The body is not an object. It is the condition and context through which I am able to have a relation to objects. It is both immanent and transcendent. Insofar as I live the body, it is a phenomenon experienced by me and thus provides the very horizon and perspectival point which places me in the world and makes relations between me, other objects, and other subjects possible. -E. Grosz

NEW VIDEO https://vimeo.com/62844515

I thought CAPE was a great website with a ton of wonderful resources. Found one project that I feel is really important. The body and its perception process can help us understand ourselves and the world in  a meaningful way, we just need let go of our own self-conscious subjectivity.

THIS STINKS: Using the Five Senses to Explain Myself

David Rench - Agassiz Elementary School

Jacqui Russell - Teaching Artist-Chicago Childrens' Theatre

Agassiz Elementary School has been working with C.A.P.E. for more than 10 years.  A Performing Arts Magnet Cluster school, Agassiz is the most diverse school in the Lakeview neighborhood.  For over 15 years Agassiz has housed 3 classrooms dedicated to students with autism.  For 10 of those years Ms. Russell has worked as a teaching artist to those students.  Through the use of drama activities, Ms. Russell and Mr. Rench have been working together to improve the children's communication skills.  For the past 3 of their 7 years together they have worked to help the children better express their emotions.  This year they built on those skills and tried to help the students to better explain their reasons for 'liking' or 'disliking' things.  The students studied the five senses and used the five senses and similes to express their likes and dislikes.

Something has changed inside of me recently. Perhaps it is because I am working with phenomenology and the perception process of the body that I am suddenly overcome with an extreme heightened sensory experience. As I write about it for my thesis I can't get it out fast enough. It is overflowing. I can't help but move.

https://vimeo.com/62507089

Because I didn't say anything in class about the websites we looked at yesterday, just wanted to say a bit about them.

I thought that AREA Chicago had a pretty decent site. It was easy to figure out what they were about and the layout was clean. I actually really liked the topics tab. I found it was a great way to find the articles I was really interested in.
One of the articles that I really enjoyed was
Sex in the Age of Environmental DisasterWords by Jeff Edwards

I loved the Stockyard Institute website. Perhaps more because I liked what they were doing than the actual layout of the site. I really enjoyed that they had media tabs and tons of videos and audio. Although, I thought the promo video was an awful representation of them. The voice, which I assumed was Jim Duignan, was extremely boring and the footage itself was unclear and didn't engage me at all. This was disappointing because I was really excited about the projects that they were doing.

I was really attracted to the Omaha Residency because this is something I've wanted to participate in or put together myself.

Omaha Residency The Union Stockyard Residency

Museum 2.0 wow, so much text all over the place. It was too much for me to really get into and there were not enough images to really grab me but Nina's posts are great. One I was really  interested in was On White Privilege and Museums. This is an issue I've thought about a lot and the comment conversation on this post was really interesting.

Here is my latest video. Not much, just a short phrase I put together from observations I was doing at a homeless shelter in Pilsen. One of my favorite things to do is retrograde movement. This is hard for my dancers to do so I record my choreography and make a video of it with the forward version and then the reverse. This way my dancers learn the movement phrase as all forward movement. I like to add music because it makes me crazy to have to watch myself over and over again while I teach the phrase.
This particular song is by Man Man and it's called Rather Go Blind. Enjoy!

MCA podcast

I've had pretty intense post performance depression the past couple of days but last night I was lucky enough to be partnered up with Paul and Stuart which turned out to be very entertaining.

I also really enjoyed Akram Zaatari's short film  Still from Tomorrow everything will be alright, 2010

website

I have to create my own website for a class. Since we are checking out websites will you let me know what you think? Just keep in mind that this is my first website!

http://www.raphaelleziemba.com/

My fear of not being able to dance as I get older is overwhelming at times but this video helped me realize that will never happen :) Enjoy!

http://youtu.be/ibmcR-pk92g

MCA and Art Junction

I really liked both the MCA and the Art Junction websites. They were both visually pleasing for me and I was able to navigate through them easily.
One thing I liked about the MCA's website is that when clicking on location, hours, admissions or calendar it would drop down and give you basic information and not lead you to another page. They also had a video page of upcoming and past performances which I really enjoyed.
Art Junction had a wonderful resources tab that offered so many different educational tools. Definitely something I will use in the future.