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Movement for people 50+ – Penelope Morout 1024 1024 akropoditi13

Movement for people 50+ – Penelope Morout

SCULPTING BODY-IMAGES: THE AGE-FREE BODY
Movement workshop for people 50+ 

Sculpting Body-Images: The Age-Free Body is a workshop shaped for any adult participant interested in movement & play as a way to improve physical and cognitive abilities, while acquiring defense and repair strategies towards a healthy aging.
Based on scientific research, it has been discovered that it takes approximately 400 repetitions to create a new synapse in the brain, unless it is done in play, in which case it only takes 10 to 20 repetitions.
In Sculpting Body-Images: The Age-Free Body practice, the space is approached as a movement playground and the participants -regardless of age and previous experience- are introduced in the concept of multi-age play-based learning as a means of reconfiguring the physiological process of aging. Through the use of spatial, temporal and physical constraints, as well as game-like situations inspired by Fighting Monkey Practice (founded by Linda Kapetanea & Jozef Frucek) we will test our bodily structure, gain resilience and agility, while connecting with the child within. The main objective of The Age-Free Body workshop is to create a safe learning space, where the participants are guided to motivate each other, while stimulating their nervous system, developing their motor skills, and improving their coordination, rhythm, and elastic footwork skills.
Far and foremost, it is to build a caring, judgment-free community, where all members are encouraged to express and embrace their individuality as a valuable asset in a mixed-age, movement-based setting.

Ages: 50+
Levels: All

Photo credit:

Penelope Morout

A graduate of the National School of Dance (Athens) and the National Technical University of Athens – School of Architecture, with a Master’s degree in Theatre Practices from ArtEZ University of the Arts (NL), Penelope Morout is an interdisciplinary dance artist interested in creating hybrid projects through the fusion of various mediums.
As a dancer & performer, she has performed at the Kalamata International Dance Festival, at Athens and Epidaurus Festival, at Teatro de la Danza Guillermina Bravo CDMX and since 2018 she has been working with theatre companies as a director/choreographer/scenographer. As a filmmaker, she has collaborated with TANZAHOi International Screendance Festival Hamburg and has participated in exhibitions and various video dance & dance animation festivals around the world (Italy, Brazil, France, Greece, Indonesia).
Within the years, she has evolved “Sculpting Body-Images” workshop, which she shares around the world (PERA GAU School of Performing Arts Cyprus, Munus Encuentro Mexico, Nunart Guinardó Barcelona, The School of Disobedience Budapest, Murate Art District Florence). Within 2023, she has created original group pieces in collaboration with Area Espai de Dansa i Creació Barcelona, MUDA Dance Center Ghent and Škola suvremenog plesa Ane Maletić Zagreb. She consistently trains and gets inspired by “Fighting Monkey Practice” (founded by Linda Kapetanea and Jozef Frucek), which she has been teaching since 2021 at the Kalamata International Dance Festival in Greece for participants over 50 years old.
In 2021, Penelope Morout founded CROSS IMPACT Co, and, ever since, is actively creating her own work. Both her previous performance THE BOX || That Dead Space Between Us, as well as her new one EMOTIONAL DOGS have been funded by the Hellenic Ministry of Culture. For the latter, she has gained additional support from X-Church (Gainsborough, UK), El Sortidor (Barcelona, ES) and the Murate Art District (Florence, ΙΤ).

Day out of Time 1024 1024 akropoditi13

Day out of Time

“The dancing bear rises…to reincarnate society.” Tyrone O’Ros

From sunrise to sunset, a number of dancers devote the day to being in a state of dance. Each of them do so individually in selected public spaces in the centre of a city.
This practice originated as a personal need, as a way of seeking and testing the perception of dance on a personal, social, and environmental perspective. An act dedicated to the union of dance and life, an opportunity for tracing the poetry that exists both inside us and around us. A dialogue with limits and nature, calling into question the various ways in which dance emerges.
The body in dance opens out a multiplicity of meaning – its generosity offers a different kind of awareness. The dancer is within the action of his own practice inscribing new possibilities of presence. As with the qualities of ‘a gift’ the dancer demands nothing, seeks not to gain praise, but makes an embodied offer that generates reflection. This reflection implicates the body and presence of the spectator / passerby, the landscape, and the wider context of movement we are contained in.
The audience is invited to visit the dancers using an uploaded/printed map. They may visit the dancers throughout the whole day, and stay with them for however long they wish, witnessing the event.
An integral part of the practice is that there is a support team composed of volunteers (not necessarily dancers), who individually visit the dancers throughout the day, offering water, fruits, and support.

Workshop – Process
The proposed workshop will introduce students to the research and ideas behind Day Out of Time, prepare and guide them through 3 hour and 6 hour ‘Day Out of Time’ trials, and finish with a ‘Day Out of Time’ performance, in which participants will go into ‘Day Out of Time’ for the duration of a whole day, with the possibility of inviting an audience.
At the research level, ‘Day out of Time’ is a practice that can be experienced by anyone interested. The preparation includes discussion and assimilation of the philosophical as well as practical research and approach, introducing some practices that which are crucial for endurance and the handling of experience in such a dense environment as the center of a city and how to tackle the performance aspect while remaining honestly within a practice.
The overall preparation process will be adapted to the program and needs of the dancers and the allocated time.

Dance never stops, and we dancers go on in and out of his melody and expression. Perhaps our deeper ability as dancers is to receive dance, not to create it.

Day out of Time so far
Day out of Time took place for the first time on the island of Hydra in the summer of 2014 during the R.I.C.E. (www.riceonhydra.org). Since then, Vitoria Kotsalou has performed Day Out of Time, either alone or with other dancers seven times, in public places, within the framework of the Akropoditi DanceFest in Syros, at the RICEAN School of Dance in Hydra (2015-2018), in public places in Athens and during Vitoria’s residency at La Caldera in Barcelona in 2018. In summer 2017 ‘Day Out of Time’ was performed at the Athens Festival with 21 dancers taking part in the center of Athens.

Ages: Adults
Level: Open

Photo credit: Kiranna Gkioka, Eleanna Kotsikou

Vasiliki Tsagkari

Vasiliki Tsagkari has studied education at the University of Athens and dance at city of Bristol college in the UK. Then, from 2005 to 2010, she traveled in Europe and the U.S, attending classes and intensive workshops, designing, and following her own nomadic dance study program.  She has trained in contemporary dance, and she has studied somatics, improvisation and instant composition with many different international teachers.
She works as an independent dance artist for almost twenty years. She has performed with improvisation groups in the Netherlands, Belgium, United Kingdom, Germany, and Greece. From 2006 to 2009 she has been living and working with the artists’ collective ARM in Maastricht, in the Netherlands. She has created five solo projects and has done a series of collaborations as well as group projects that have been presented in festivals, theatres, and performance spaces but also in public space, in Greece, the Netherlands, Germany. She has ongoing and long-term collaborations with Vittoria Kotsalou, Dafni Stefanou, Iris Nikolaou, Aggeliki Papadatou. She has collaborated with musicians Kaspar Koenig, Cyrille Flamment and Michalis Siganidis.
She is a certified Skinner Releasing teacher since 2016. She teaches contemporary dance, improvisation and Skinner Releasing to children and adults.
Recently she lives in Messinia, southwest Greece, where she takes care of an olive grove. Physical work close to the earth and the observation of natural elements throughout the cultivating process, have opened up a field of research that informs and influences a lot her approach to dance.

Day out of Time – Vasiliki Tsagkari 1024 1024 akropoditi13

Day out of Time – Vasiliki Tsagkari

“The dancing bear rises…to reincarnate society.” Tyrone O’Ros

From sunrise to sunset, a number of dancers devote the day to being in a state of dance. Each of them do so individually in selected public spaces in the centre of a city.
This practice originated as a personal need, as a way of seeking and testing the perception of dance on a personal, social, and environmental perspective. An act dedicated to the union of dance and life, an opportunity for tracing the poetry that exists both inside us and around us. A dialogue with limits and nature, calling into question the various ways in which dance emerges.
The body in dance opens out a multiplicity of meaning – its generosity offers a different kind of awareness. The dancer is within the action of his own practice inscribing new possibilities of presence. As with the qualities of ‘a gift’ the dancer demands nothing, seeks not to gain praise, but makes an embodied offer that generates reflection. This reflection implicates the body and presence of the spectator / passerby, the landscape, and the wider context of movement we are contained in.
The audience is invited to visit the dancers using an uploaded/printed map. They may visit the dancers throughout the whole day, and stay with them for however long they wish, witnessing the event.
An integral part of the practice is that there is a support team composed of volunteers (not necessarily dancers), who individually visit the dancers throughout the day, offering water, fruits, and support.

Workshop – Process
The proposed workshop will introduce students to the research and ideas behind Day Out of Time, prepare and guide them through 3 hour and 6 hour ‘Day Out of Time’ trials, and finish with a ‘Day Out of Time’ performance, in which participants will go into ‘Day Out of Time’ for the duration of a whole day, with the possibility of inviting an audience.
At the research level, ‘Day out of Time’ is a practice that can be experienced by anyone interested. The preparation includes discussion and assimilation of the philosophical as well as practical research and approach, introducing some practices that which are crucial for endurance and the handling of experience in such a dense environment as the center of a city and how to tackle the performance aspect while remaining honestly within a practice.
The overall preparation process will be adapted to the program and needs of the dancers and the allocated time.

Dance never stops, and we dancers go on in and out of his melody and expression. Perhaps our deeper ability as dancers is to receive dance, not to create it.

Day out of Time so far
Day out of Time took place for the first time on the island of Hydra in the summer of 2014 during the R.I.C.E. (www.riceonhydra.org). Since then, Vitoria Kotsalou has performed Day Out of Time, either alone or with other dancers seven times, in public places, within the framework of the Akropoditi DanceFest in Syros, at the RICEAN School of Dance in Hydra (2015-2018), in public places in Athens and during Vitoria’s residency at La Caldera in Barcelona in 2018. In summer 2017 ‘Day Out of Time’ was performed at the Athens Festival with 21 dancers taking part in the center of Athens.

Ages: Adults
Level: Open

Photo credit: Kiranna Gkioka, Eleanna Kotsikou

Vasiliki Tsagkari

Vasiliki Tsagkari has studied education at the University of Athens and dance at city of Bristol college in the UK. Then, from 2005 to 2010, she traveled in Europe and the U.S, attending classes and intensive workshops, designing, and following her own nomadic dance study program.  She has trained in contemporary dance, and she has studied somatics, improvisation and instant composition with many different international teachers.
She works as an independent dance artist for almost twenty years. She has performed with improvisation groups in the Netherlands, Belgium, United Kingdom, Germany, and Greece. From 2006 to 2009 she has been living and working with the artists’ collective ARM in Maastricht, in the Netherlands. She has created five solo projects and has done a series of collaborations as well as group projects that have been presented in festivals, theatres, and performance spaces but also in public space, in Greece, the Netherlands, Germany. She has ongoing and long-term collaborations with Vittoria Kotsalou, Dafni Stefanou, Iris Nikolaou, Aggeliki Papadatou. She has collaborated with musicians Kaspar Koenig, Cyrille Flamment and Michalis Siganidis.
She is a certified Skinner Releasing teacher since 2016. She teaches contemporary dance, improvisation and Skinner Releasing to children and adults.
Recently she lives in Messinia, southwest Greece, where she takes care of an olive grove. Physical work close to the earth and the observation of natural elements throughout the cultivating process, have opened up a field of research that informs and influences a lot her approach to dance.

Intimate Bodies – Antigone Gyra and Joanna Kampilafka 1024 1024 akropoditi13

Intimate Bodies – Antigone Gyra and Joanna Kampilafka

Repertoire Workshop / Kinitiras Omega 65+ 

How do I prepare for a performance?
How do I get intimate with my body?
How do I get intimate with a public space and through my presence I transform it to a performance space?

Kinitiras Omega is coming back to Syros this time aiming to share a site-specific performance that is preparing in Athens, at the celebrational 10th Akropoditi Festival in Hermoupolis. The performance is dealing with the idea of intimacy trough the re-appropriation of the bodies and the public space. Through this workshop the social visibility of people and bodies of older ages is being in priority.
The performance that will be created is aiming to contribute to a creative growing up of humanity during which the body and dance will show the way to human freedom. This unique freedom that blossoms out of people who have the ownership of bodies that they love, recognize, and take care of. People who are open to new ideas and explorations regardless the date of birth that is written in their identities.
In order to continue the dialogue of Kinitiras Omega company with the habitants and visitors of the Syros, this repertoire workshop will give the opportunity to the participants to be part of the Athenian performance. They will have the chance to enter a process of corporeal and spiritual preparation in order to develop intimacy with their own body and transform it into a performative body.
The first part of the workshop consists of a movement warm up through various techniques such as yoga, pilates and physiotherapy for body strengthening and recovery while at the same time there will be movement exploration of the idea of intimacy. Following this, through movement and personal reconstitution games the group dynamics of the participants will be encouraged in order to continue to the second part of the workshop.
The second part of the workshop focuses on movement improvisations and teaching of a short choreography piece through exchange and research of ideas and movement material. The last two days will be devoted to rehearsals so that the group can share the final site-specific performance at a public space of Hermoupolis.

Ages: 65+
Levels: All

Photo credit: Δημήτρης Παρθύμος, Λήδα Τουλουμάκου

Kinitiras Ω (Omega) started in 2014 with a vision for mature adults to access dance and theater through a creative community where they can activate their bodies as well as strengthen and cultivate their creative expression.
Working with professionals from Kinitiras company, the group gained experience in co-creation, rehearsal, and production by participating in artistic events and performances. So, in addition to the performances at the end of the year, the Kinitiras Ω group inspired the documentary KIN.Ω (Chrysanthi Badeka), traveled to Esslingen, Germany, to attend the stAGE festival where they presented the work of Eros and Psychi directed by Antigone Gyra and participated in Ana Sánchez-Colberg’s Seven to Seventh Project at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation’s Summer Nostos Festival. In the last years, Kinitiras Ω has been working steadily with the AKROPODITI Dance and Performing Arts Centre based in Syros, and every summer a workshop is held – a collaboration between Kinitiras Ω and a group of 65+ permanent residents of the island – within the framework of the annual Akropoditi DanceFest.
During the academic year 2020-21 (November-April) Antigone Gyra, artistic director of Kinitiras and one of the coordinators of Kinitiras Ω, prepared – in the midst of a pandemic – a study, with the financial support of the Greek Ministry of Culture, on the subject of “Contemporary dance and dance theatre in the third age. A study on the work of the group KINITIRAS Ω”, which was presented in April 2022 at Flux Laboratory Athens, in June in the context of the first two-day workshop on dance held at ASKT and organized by SE.HO.HO. (Employees’ Union in the Dance Space) and recently in Syros at the 9th Akropoditi DanceFest.

Antigone Gyra

Antigone Gyra creates dance and theatre performances as well as video art and is the mother of three children. She graduated from the London Laban Centre with distinction, and she was awarded the Graduates’ Choreography award in 1993. In 1996 she created Kinitiras Dance Spectacle (Chorotheama) company with which she has choreographed many works up until today. She has also facilitated workshops and given lectures on dance and theatre subjects.
In 1995 she received the second award for young choreographers of Rallou Manou competition with her work “The stories, you grew up with, grew up”. Her works have been performed in Greece and abroad. In 1997 her work “Doors and Clouds” represented Greece in the Young artists Biennale in Turin and in other festivals in Greece and Italy. In 2002 her solo work “X” with Ioanna Kampylafka was qualified for the Choreography Competition in Hanover. In 2004 she created her street dance theatre works “1896” and “Lysistrata’s Cry” after being ordered by Athens 2004 Olympic Games. In 2006 she started creating her trilogy on war. The first two parts of the trilogy “«Lysistrata’s Cry» (2006) and “Klytemnistra Invisible” (2008) were chosen and performed in the 2nd and 3rd Dance Platform (Athens Megaro Mousikis). With her work “Klytemnistra Invisible” she represented Greece in the 8th International Fringe Festival in Thailand. In 2009 her work “The Net” toured in provincial areas supported by the Ministry of Culture. In February 2010 she presented her solo work “Gone” during the European program City to City Cabaret in Sofia and Athens. From 2010 until 2012 she was the artistic director of the European Network SPIDER ARTISTIC NET representing Greece. During this, she presented the third part of her trilogy “Handle with Care”.
In the theatre she has cooperated as a choreographer and movement director with many theatre companies and directors such as: Theatro Technis (G. Lazanis), THOC (Ch. Siopachas), National Theatre (G. Theodosiadis, Efi Theodorou, S,Fasoulis), Theama Company, Dh.Pe.The Kalamatas (G. Kakleas), Theatre Porta (A. Kalogridis), Theatre Mousouri (T. Vasileiou), Theatre Simio (A.Diamantis), Theatre of Neos Kosmos (D. Arapoglou), Ison Ena Company (I. Remediaki), Opsis Company (A. Tompouli), Theatre Diana (G. Paloumpis – E. Rantou), Theatre of Herodus Atticus (S.Evangelatos) etc.
In December 2008 she funded, together with Vicky Adamou and Flora Kalomoiri, the first residency centre for performing arts in Greece, Kinitiras Studio.
Since March 2017 she teaches at the drama school “Dilos-Dimitra Chatoupi” and is a member of the artistic company GAV (Gyra, Adamou, Venetsanopoulos) with which they created the performance “Deep Sigh” with the support of the Greek Ministry of Culture, as well as the action “Pop Up Readings” which was ordered by the organization of Athens International Book Capital 2018.
Antigone designed the action EK PLIXI (Sur Prise) that brings dance in schools while organizing Erasmus+ youth exchange programs with the aim of social awareness (lgbtq+, refugees, hate speech etc.). In the last two years, she carried out two choreographic researches (Femininity in transition, Contemporary Dance and Third Age) with the support of foreign bodies and the Ministry of Culture.

Ioanna Kampylafka

Ioanna Kampylafka graduated from the London Laban Centre (Bachelor of Arts in Dance Theatre) and Middlesex University (diploma in Interior Design). During the academic year 2003-2004, with a scholarship from the Fulbright Foundation, she attended various dance schools in New York (Movement Research, Trisha Brown, Dance Space, Susan Klein, Barbara Mahler). During Spring and Summer of 2007, with the support of the program of Unesco, Aschberg Bursaries for Artists, she worked as a dance teacher, choreographer, and dancer in Bangkok Thailand as a guest resident artist at the faculty of Dance School of Performing Arts. In the spring of 2008, after being invited by the organization “Temple of Fine Arts”, she taught composition and improvisation in Singapore and Malaysia.
Ioanna is member of Kinitiras since 1998 and member of the artistic collective Medea Electronique since 2008. As a choreographer she has worked with: “Splish-Splash” (Yannis Economides), Point Theatre (Nikos Diamantis), Theatre Art (Kugiumtzis), Regional Theatre of Kalamata (Stavros Tsakiris), Kalouta Theatre (George Frantzeskakis) etc. She has taught movement and improvisation in drama schools “Themelio”, “Theatre Arts”, “D.Fotiadi”, “Theatre of Changes” and “G. Theodosiades”.

Continuous Interruptions – Antigone Gyra and Aliki Avdelopoulou 800 800 akropoditi13

Continuous Interruptions – Antigone Gyra and Aliki Avdelopoulou

A movement, breath, dance and voice workshop for older people

Kinitiras Omega is returning to Akropoditi Dance Festival with an intensive workshop of movement and voice research. The Movement of everyday is a very important element of contemporary choreographic creation. During the first part of the workshop, we will investigate the numerous possibilities that is given to us through this movement in order to develop dance composition. At the same time, we will focus on how this movement of everyday is interrupted-broken when something unexpected occurs. What changes in the quality of movement regarding the use of time, weight and flow? We will also work on the idea of our bodies as mental, spiritual, and physical material and what happens when this material is broken. Finally, we will share personal stories from our lives that we consider as “breaking news” and we will question the effect that these kinds of stories had /have on our kinetic and somatic behavior and being.

In the second part of the workshop based on the axis of the pair breath-voice we will explore if and how the continuous flow of the breath is affected by an unexpected event of everyday life. By questioning and working on exercises of vocal, rhythmical and music improvisation we will discover together what could cause the interruption of the rhythm of the breath in vocal expression, speech, song of each one and the group.

In the end of the workshop there is going to be a lecture-demonstration of Antigone Gyras’ research on Contemporary Dance and Dance Theatre in Older Age with sharing to the public short parts of the workshop discoveries.

Ages: 65+
Levels: All levels

 

Antigone Gyra

Antigone Gyra studied dance theatre at Laban Centre in London. She is the founder and artistic director of Kinitiras Network for Performing Arts (www.kinitiras.com). With Kinitiras she founded and directed the first residency centre for performing arts in Greece, from 2008 until 2019, Kinitiras Studio. Her works with Kinitiras have been commissioned many times from the Ministry of culture and other public and private organizations and have been performed in Greece and abroad. She is also designing and running community based, dance in education and elderly people programs. As a freelancer choreographer, she is working at the theatre with many directors in National and free theatre and she is teaching movement and choreography in professional drama and dance schools.

Aliki Avdelopoulou

Aliki Avdelopoulou was born and raised in Athens, Greece.
Fellow and graduate of the National Theatre, studied piano and music theory at the National Conservatory and voice with A. Leigh and M. Gementzaki and trained in theatre and music in various programs and seminars.
Founding member of the theatrical group “Viomichaniki” and “Theatre Lithografion” in Patras, Greece.
Since 2006, she is a member of the “Kinitiras Art Network” and has taught in Erasmus program (Crooked House Theatre Company – Kairos Youth Exchange – Ireland ’18) and seminars (Kinitiras studio).
Since 2017 she has been teaching voice and theatre in the “Kinitiras Ω” group (over 65) (stage festival – Germany ’18 / Seven to Seventh by Ana Sanchez – Colberg – Summer Nostos Festival – ISN ’19 / International Dance & Performing Arts Festival Akropoditi DanceFest – Syros ’21).
She was a member of the OTE (Organisation of Telecommunications of Greece) Athens Mixed Choir for a decade with participations and distinctions in Greek and International choir festivals and now she is a member of the Choir of the National Conservatory (Nea Smyrni branch).
Since 1995 she collaborates professionally with Athenian theatre companies and Municipal and Regional Theatres in repertoire plays, musicals and dance theatre, as an actress, assistant director, assistant music arrangement, in production management and in vocal teaching, with participations in Greek and international theatre festivals with important creators such as S. Evangelatos, A. Antipas, E. Karaindrou, S. Tsakiris, D. Avdeliodis, G. Theofanous, F. Evangelinos, K. Samara, A. Gyra, V. Myrianthopoulos, F. Diplas, V. Adamou and others.
As a front woman of the electro pop duo “Monitor” but also individually, she has discography participations, but also participations in music live concerts with various musical groups.
She directed the solo opera “La Voix Humain” and collaborated on TV talent shows (“Music School” and “Junior Music Stars”) as vocal coach.

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