Contemporary dance workshop /Flora Fauna Project
Maria Nilsson Waller and Stace Gill
ABOUT THE EVENT
This workshop led by choreographer Maria Nilsson Waller and composer Stace Gill will in a fun a playful manner lead you through a movement class where we explore dance and movement improvisation as a language of expression, storytelling and group communication. Influences from a range of movement techniques such as various contemporary dance styles, classical ballet and yoga will appear in the class. The format and method developed throughout the Flora Fauna Project is a unique blend of movement practice and philosophy informed by Maria’s 17 years experience as a dance artist and teacher, together with Stace’s Montessori teacher degree prior to her career as a composer. Curious, explorative, playful and hopeful, the aim is that all who join us will be directed back to themselves, ready to discover the world again with open minds and alert hearts.
The workshop takes the participants through a choreographic process where we practice body awareness and dance technique, individual artistic expression, task oriented collaboration and finally a small performance within the group. The artistic process and methods of working are the same for both professional and non-professional dancers. All ages and genders welcome.
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Flora Fauna Project is a series of performances, talks and workshops led by choreographer Maria Nilsson Waller and electronic composer/musician/writer Stace Gill/The Sei.
Together they have been making immersive stage experiences, talks and workshops exploring our relationship to nature and environment, natural intelligence, evolution, metamorphoses, gender and sexuality, community and social dreaming since 2017. Their projects have to date been performed by professional dancers, by 80 ten-year old students in Ballyfermot, throughout theatre venues, libraries and cathedrals in Ireland and Sweden. The artists involved not only want to make work that entertains or comments, but inspires action for a more autonomous and sustainable world. Engaging audiences in conversations and open workshops is an integral element of the project.
In 2019/2020 they are Dance Artists in Residence at D-Light Studios, and will together with Michael Darragh MacAuely of Dublin GAA DCC/NEIC, Project Arts Centre, Dance Ireland and photographer Paul Kelly, create a number of works, including large scale piece BLADE for 30 performers, a documentary, a new performance platform for Irish and International artists, as well as premiere of their new duet work LUMEN.
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Swedish choreographer Maria Nilsson Waller (@nilssonwaller) has presented work in Ireland for the last 7 years: Merry.Go. Round, Blanca, Last Land and Prime for Dublin Dance Festival, Project Arts Centre, and on tours through Dance Limerick and Firkin Crane. In 2015 she choreographed a unique and much noticed version of Swan Lake for professional soccer team ÖFK. With work described as pure emotion, mesmerising and profound again and again she draws our attention to our relationship to nature and the environment, examining the borders between the known and unknown, science versus faith and mythology. She was elected Hoffnungsträgerin 2015 by Tanz magazin, and was a Dance Ireland Associate Artist 2013/2014.
Electronica group THE SEI (@storyofthesei) (formerly known as OCHO) is comprised of Irish singer/composer/writer Stace Gill with production by Ross Dowling aka DOS (Talos, James Vincent McMorrow). With a distinctive sound and presence that has been compared to Imogen Heap, Portishead and Bat For Lashes, their latest release ‘Metroma’ on Paragon Records is gaining the attention of respected critics from various blogs and fans in places as diverse as Japan, Australia, the USA and Ireland.
