Contact Fundamentals - The Essential Building Blocks
An open level course in Contact Improvisation

Contact Improvisation is a system of movement based on the communication between two or more moving bodies and their combined relationship to the physical laws that govern their motion – gravity, momentum, energy, inertia. It is a free play with balance bringing forth a physical/emotional truth about a shared moment of movement that leaves participants informed, centered and enlivened. The body in order to open to these sensations must learn to abandon a certain quality of wilfulness to experience the natural flow of movement. Practice includes rolling smoothly, falling safely, being upside down, supporting and giving weight effortlessly. Alertness is developed in order to work in an energetic state of physical disorientation, trusting in one’s basic survival instincts.


Andrew de L. Harwood
Andrew de Lotbinière Harwood is a leading international teacher, performer and creator in the field of instantaneous choreography and Contact Improvisation since 1975. He is the artistic director of AH HA Productions, a project oriented company devoted to Improvisation and based in Montreal. Andrew studied extensively, taught and performed with Steve Paxton, Nancy Stark Smith and Nita Little, three of the founding members of Contact Improvisation. His background also includes gymnastics, Yoga, Modern Dance, Release Technique, Alexander Technique, Improvisation and Aikido. His work has been presented in numerous international festivals since 1980. Andrew danced for the companies of Fulcrum, Jo Lechay, Marie Chouinard and Jean-Pierre Perreault, and continues to collaborate yearly with the Echo Case since 1993. He has also collaborated in performance with Peter Bingham, Marc Boivin, Chris Aiken, Kirstie Simson, Ray Chung, Lisa Nelson, Benoît Lachambre, Marc Thompkins, and Ginette Laurin among many others. Harwood taught advanced workshops and performed at many major Contact Improvisation festivals in the past few years: Freiburg Contact Festival (Germany), Israeli Contact Festival, Zip Contact Festival (Italy), Kontact Budapest (Hungary), Trans Contact Festival (Romania). He has also taught classes to the world renowned companies of O’ Vertigo and Marie Chouinard in Montréal as well as the fabulous Montréal Circus group called Les Sept Doigts de la Main. He is the recipient of the Canada Council’s Jacqueline-Lemieux award for the year 2000.