With the right timing, the right ”entrance” and the right feeling for what is told, a simple somersault can be just as efficient as a double salto in a performance or in a narrative situation. We work above all to place the acrobatics in a scenic context. This means that we work to get the acrobatics to function as a bearer of the story or as its own number, a number of its own, where we work to make it amusing, flowing and integrated in the rest of the plot and movement patterns on stage.
If we have the time I start with teaching a training method where we at the same time warm-up our bodies and work in physical contact with very easy acrobatically or mutual exercises.
First I teach a few easier (the level of difficulty depends on the group) acrobatic figures that we later use as common references. They will also be the figures we continue to work from. Most of all we work with acrobatics in pairs or with more persons. Depending on the length of the workshop we gradually add more acrobatic figures to increase the material we work from.
Entrances, timing and flows in the figure are some of the greatest keys in order to make them look less clumsy or shaky. It is more important to find a flexible flow than to do things as advance as possible.
Another important part in putting the acrobatics on stage is reactions, takes and turns. It is those things that help the acrobatics to get a theatrical value, tell the story or take the plot further, so that the acrobatics doesn’t just become empty ornaments.
The goal with the workshop is of course to teach more acrobatics and to get it to be a more flexible and tempered part of a performance, but also to increase the participant’s acrobatic imaginative power and understanding of the possibilities and conditions for acrobatics on stage.
If you are interested in this workshop click HERE.