Form is one of the seven elements of art. To build it requires lines, shapes and spaces, between and within, encapsulated, to give FORM depth. The element of FORM is built into our bodies. We accomodate FORM’s three dimensions (3D): height, width and its third quality, depth. FORM in yoga & dance pulls it off.
FORM is a part of us: not in a 2D-shape-of-us photograph or video. It’s skeletal. Its muscular. Our bodies’ FORM is its own active, breathing presence.
FORM in yoga & dance is attainable. Many other activities from tai chi to tennis: lawn bowling to cycling: and so on, on and on…) make FORM accessible.
To that end, my blog intention uses the FORMer two examples, close to my heart.
1) YOGA
Yoga comprises postures called asanas (from the Sanskrit word, to sit). Whether sitting, lying down, forward or backward bending, twisting, balancing or standing (in the cornerstone tadasana), the age-old practice of yoga borrows pose names from nature (tree and mountain pose). Animals (in the poses of dog, cat-cow), plants (lotus), birds (pigeon, eagle), reptiles (cobra), and heroic figures (warrior I, II, and III) embody FORM through the yoke or discipline of yoga.
Take the case of B.K.S. Iyengar who expanded the basic postures to over 200 asanas in his 1966 book, Light on Yoga (the first of 13 books published). Through the use of props such as belts and blocks, he established postures with precise body alignment, as in his signature pose, Lord of the Dance or Natarajasana.
In my own yoga practice, Iyengar’s prop-practice helps maintain flexibility and strength. My husband and I began an Iyengar practice in the mid-1980s that continues to this day. Our former and present teachers, Susan Bull and Sarah Godfrey, both studied with the master in Pune, India, as well as with Iyengar initiatives in Canada and elsewhere.
2) DANCE
Human FORM holds many possibilities, in part thanks to the coordinated movement of bones and muscles in their articulation at joint junctures. Our joints number as many as are degrees in a circle: 360. We maintain them for as long as we can. The ‘motion is lotion’ saying says a lot about our second activity of dance.
The fundamentals of contemporary dance borrow from classical and improvisational movement in French names (parallel to the Sanskrit in yoga): bending, stretching, rising, gliding, weight transferring, jumping, turning and darting. Childhood ballet classes taught me the positions of feet/arms I, II, III, IV and V at the barre, but more recently, FORM has been calling as my primary element of visual art. FORM fulfills each and every dimension.
I have completed eight classes in Creative Movement (for seniors) at the Scotia Bank Dance Centre in downtown Vancouver. Facilitators like Lorraine White-Wilkinson, Claire French, Cynthia Miller, and Kay Huang bring prowess and passion to each hour-long class. They are role models as well as the female equivalent of gurus…gurvis (from the Sanskrit).
Our small class caps it off over coffee, except for the final class, which ties in with the opening of LIFT Festival.
3) LIFT FESTIVAL
Intergenerational dance: performances, workshops, discussions, and time to connect across ages?
‘What’s that all about?’ We wonder(women) wander downhill from the Scotiabank Dance Centre to the Roundhouse Community Arts Centre at the foot of Davie Street, step in step, as if choreographed.
We’re about to find out in two performances. The first is an All Bodies Dance Project. We watch spellbound as nine dancers dressed in black and white enter the stage to live piano accompaniment. Their diverse abilities, genders, sizes (and yes, ages) weave & whir, across and within a basic-black backdrop, culminating in blue lights that each dancer holds, that dim to black as they bring the dance to conclusion.
What follows is a solo entitled ‘Alone with the moon’ by Claudia Moore (Lesley Telford, co-collaborators). Claudia has said that she wants to continue to evolve as a 72-year-old performer. She revels in discoveries still to be made. Integrated in this piece are memories of her past performances.
Inverso Productions, under Artistic Director, Lesley Telford has brought this first-ever dance festival into creation in order to ‘connect across ages through movement…based on a belief in dance as a means to connect beyond words towards a greater depth of understanding across age groups.”
On the up-side, Lesley wanted an uplifting festival, thus the LIFT title.
4) FORM in YOGA & DANCE
To conclude, that’s how we part company… for now. Our FORMS are uplifted, not only from the performances, but from our 8 weeks together. Whatever limitations our maturity or frailty brings, we are LIFTed in body and spirit.
FORM in yoga & dance helps bring awareness. We leave with our three dimensions fully-FORMED, fully in-FORMed. Perhaps we’ve been heightened: made wide and deep in our 3-D understanding.
FORM in yoga & dance has come about for the express purpose to demonstrate artful expression. With this in mind, we are, without a doubt, better off… until our next session.