Teaching
● Flying Low & Passing Through
● RADICAL SOFTNESS
● Somatic YOGA Practice
● [to] Take Position
Cristina has been sharing her knowledge and researching around methodologies of teaching that promote a somatic experience, autonomous embodiment and thought process, since 2010.
Being a qualified Flying Low & Passing Through teacher and a Certified Hatha Yoga Teacher, she incorporates information from diverse practices into her teaching, so as the processes around the creation of the choreographic works.
Besides workshops in the studio, she has been also engaged as a dramaturg and advices artists regarding strategy and artistic discourse also working often as an Outside Eye in creative processes.
She is a faculty member of Artez Hogeschool voor de Kunsten, Arnhem (NL), BA Dance Performance since 2011; a regular guest lecturer at Codarts, University for the Arts, Rotterdam (NL) and HKA, Amsterdam University for the Arts and was the Coordinator of the FCT subject [internships in a working context] at Ginasiano Escola de Dança from 2015-2018.
She has been facilitating classes and workshops at:
Austria
● Tanzquartier Wien, Viena
Estonia
● Tantsu ruum, Tallin
France
Germany
● K3 –Zentrum fur Choreographie, Hamburg
● Marameo, Berlin
● MD Kollektiv, Koln
● Contemporary Dance School Hamburg
● Folkwang Universität der Künste, Essen
Ireland
● Dance Ireland, Dublin
Italy
● Dance Italia, Lucca
Poland
● Stary Browar, Poznan
Portugal
● Fórum Dança, Lisbon
● Estúdios Victor Córdon, Lisbon
● Ginasiano Escola de Dança, Vila Nova de Gaia
● Conservatório de Música de Coimbra
● Balleteatro, Porto
● Oficina Zero, Porto
● SummerLab, Viseu
● Estágio de Dança de Aveiro, Aveiro
● c-e-m, Lisbon
● Companhia Instável, Porto
● ACE – Academia Contemporânea do Espectáculo, Porto
Slovenia
● Plesna Izba Maribor, Maribor
Spain
● Centro Danza Canal, Madrid
The Netherlands
● ArtEZ – Hogeschool voor de Kunsten, Arnhem (BA Dance Performance)
● Codarts – Rotterdamse Dansacademie (BA Dance Performance)
● Moderne Theaterdans – Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten (MTD – BA Dance Performance)
● Henny Jurriens Stichting, Amsterdam
● Circle, Rotterdam
● de Stilte, Breda
● Danstraining Brabant
United States of America
● Mark Morris Dance Center, organized by Dance Italia/ Stefanie Nelson, New York
Flying Low & Passing Through
Classes & Workshops
Cristina's pedagogic practice started in 2010, after taking part in 50 days of Flying Low and Passing Through in Costa Rica with David Zambrano, where she was the only Portuguese artist to be invited to participate in this unique project, after years of being his student.
At the end of the 50-day intensive, each participant received certification by Zambrano allowing them to further develop Flying Low and Passing Through within their own artistic practice. Working with David Zambrano during the most intensive period he taught in a row, she has gained the teaching qualifications for Flying Low and Passing through, which is since then integrating in her own teaching practice, always in constant change and development.
"I embody and share the knowledge of David Zambrano’s Flying Low technique adapted to my own artistic vision and needs, always taking care of the temporary group that is formed for the class. I see it as a technique that teaches my body spiralling pathways and skills to move in and out of the floor in a very direct and intentional way - it's something I always keep in my pocket using it when in need, as with other techniques. In the practice, the dynamics increase progressively using imagery and touch by exploring and exploding each short exercise, where participants are challenged to find their own solutions through experimenting, figuring out what are the pathways which cross their bodies, rather than established formulas or shapes. We work on the principles and the states rather than the exercises and everyone is challenged to disconnecting from the usual right & left or front & back idea. The technique focuses on the relationship with the floor by utilising simple movement sequences and by practicing speed and the release of energy throughout the body in order to activate the centre."
RADICAL SOFTNESS
Workshops & sessions around artistic research
RADICAL SOFTNESS is a personal appropriation of an expression I've even tattooed on my body. It describes my position in the world and how I take part in it and in everything I do. I depart from the premise that personal is political and that art, even if we want it to be, it is not political enough. I create not as an artist, but as a person, as a woman, as a citizen. Through my artistic practice I see, question and connect to politics, spirituality, ethics, and togetherness and my artistic practice weaves curating, making, performing and teaching.
I don't believe in the conventional education of dance and I wish discipline designations would be abolished — our need to define is often very restrictive.
This workshop provides an individual artistic research that is not based on forms, shapes or conventions but rather ignites from what we need, individually to be able to manifest creatively in the world. It is shaped by the transmission of experiences through asking questions.
We start by awakening our bodies and ourselves as a physical tool for deep connection with the universe, through somatic practices, aligning to the reality of the daily macro-cosmos shifts that affect our micro-cosmos as a person. Through a continuous flow of movement, the body is seen as an oracle and as a vehicle for transcendence.
Afterwards, we will explore the basics of my choreographic practice, working with several layers of attention that fade in and out, repetition and constant exposure of the research. We will be doing things for a very, very long time until we shed the layers of performing through insistency, intensity and intention. We will work with juxtapositions and metaphors, always evolving and unfolding through the necessary means: voice, body, presence, and breath work. The participants are invited to dive in the grounds of my previous pieces and to play in the meanders of ambiguity; of concrete and abstract images; of a subject and an object body.
CALM AS A BOMB • Somatic YOGA practice
online or in-person / private or group classes & workshops
My yoga-shared-practice is deeply informed by my background as a contemporary dancer and choreographer and by my artistic research based on breath work and repetition. The class is mostly intended for practitioners with experience in movement and that use the body as a vehicle of connection and transcendence, whatever that means for each person!
I follow the structure of a traditional Hatha Yoga Class, including Mantras, Kriyā (purifications), Ásana (physical postures), Yoganidrá (relaxation), Pránáyama (breath work) and Meditation in relation to the here and now.
My classes have daily focuses and intentions such as alignment, specific body parts and breath work. I incorporate imagery and knowledge from other disciplines such as somatic embodiment and astrology in order to promote the insight of each asana. The asana is not only a shape but also a state and for sure a container of intensity, breath, movement, locks, speed in all the range of it.
This is not just a physical practice but is a physical practice as well, where we bring Yoga into daily life believing that repetition brings potential for revelation and that technique is there to be used and for getting us organized. The body is our microcosmic vehicle of alignment to the macro-cosmos - we get into the body so we can get out of it.
Certified Hatha Yoga Teacher – 200H
Currently studying at Casa Ganapati, Porto
Trainee in Katonah Yoga ®
The development of my practice arises from my previous experience as a dancer and student of vedic astrology and mythology with Rita Diamond Casais and from my most recent studies on Hatha Yoga with Jorge Saraiva, Miguel Homem, Ana Sereno; on Katonah Yoga with Dages Juvelier Keates and Katonah Yoga teachers; and Astrology and embodiment with Renée Sills.
More info on this specifically? email: calmasabomb.yoga@gmail.com
[to] Take Position
group or one-on-one sessions on dramaturgy, strategy and artistic discourse
More info soon