S1 Ep21 Dance Workshop (Research as Dancing, Dancing as Research)

S1 Ep21 Dance Workshop (Research as Dancing, Dancing as Research)

In this episode, we turn explicitly to research and recognise that we have, in fact, been researching all along.

The workshop explores multiple ways research operates within dance practice: researching by watching dance in performances, studios, streets, screens, and archives; researching through taking classes and experiencing different aesthetics, techniques, and pedagogical approaches; researching through movement research, understood as open exploration through doing, often overlapping with improvisation; and researching for creation, where texts, images, stories, politics, and contexts become material for choreographic work.

From there, the episode introduces artistic research as a distinct but still-emerging field. Artistic research is framed as a way of thinking through making, where practice is not an illustration of knowledge but a method of producing it. The artwork, process, and reflection form a single field of inquiry, and questions are asked not only with words, but through bodies, materials, time, and attention. What is discovered may remain situated, embodied, sensorial, and resistant to generalisation. The episode briefly situates artistic research historically, noting its relatively recent institutional emergence through PhD programmes in the arts in the 1990s.

The episode then unfolds through three open assignments:

1. Research a dance aesthetic or style
   
   
2. Research anatomy and bodily function
   
   
3. Research a non-dance topic

The episode concludes by returning to research as an ongoing attitude rather than a fixed method. It reflects on autonomy, intuition, and criticality, arguing that intuition and research are not opposites. Research can also mean looking back at what we intuitively do, documenting it, analysing it, and learning from it. Artistic research is framed as an epistemic critique, challenging what counts as knowledge, who is allowed to produce it, and which forms of knowing are valued, including embodied, affective, collective, and non-verbal knowledge.

Rather than closing questions down, research is presented as a way of deepening complexity, increasing agency, and expanding the field of what dance can know and do.

Keep dancing. Keep researching. Reflect on how research shapes your practice.

Dance workshop
Explore, imagine, move.

A companion series to PETER, dance with. These short audio workshops invite you to explore dance through imagination, movement, and curiosity. A space to rethink what dance can be, anywhere, for anyone.

To listen to the workshops: https://stillpeter.com/peter-audio-dance-workshop/

Music leaning by mobygratis