Conversation on the image worlds of Skinner Releasing Technique & Amerta Movement with Sally E. Dean, Margit Galanter, Lily Kiara, and Julie Nathanielsz
What do dancers mean when we speak of “image”? What kinds of imaginal experiences—multisensorial, liminal, etc.—arise through our distinct movement practices?
In 2017, Sally, Lily, Julie, and I organized and taught a workshop with Suprapto Suryodarmo (Prapto) in North Bali called The Field of Reciprocity. Strongly situated in the daily life, culture, traditions, and ecology of Central Java, Prapto’s Amerta Movement practice, which each of us has deeply experienced, is an embodied study of human and natural presence, perceiving the “moving self” as a multiplicity of changing selves in a constantly changing environment. My three colleagues also share a long practice of Skinner Releasing Technique (SRT), an experiential approach to connecting physicality with imagination, developed by Joan Skinner. The pedagogy of images in SRT serves as a structure of metaphors for kinesthetic and energetic experiences.
