A Light in the Darkness

A Light In The Darkness

Dance down the sun at the EJC with Jen Gwirtz

This journey takes us through the 9th month of Kislev (כסלו) towards Chanukah and the Winter Solstice as the days shorten. Our dance-visioning will take place during the annual descent into the welcoming dark as we delve into the season, its texts and our place on the Jewish wheel of the year. It is also a way to move, sweat and challenge ourselves physically. Each evening practice session will include a warm-up and prompt-based movement improvisation as sunset descends, followed by a time for journaling and rest.

This year’s workshop will be HYBRID!!!! Masks and vaccinations are required for people dancing in-person. This workshop is for people who identify as women or non-binary. All levels of ability are welcome.

Zoom link to follow enrollment for online participants.

Dates

Thursday evenings, 12/1 - 12/22

Time

4-5pm PST

Pricing

Cost is per class with three options of giving:

$11 = Chai (all digits added together!)+Kehilla (Community, with all the digits added together, then recombined a second time…) + the Holy Name for those in financial need.

$18 = Chai (life)

$27 = Chai+Chesed (lovingkindness, with all the digits added together!) for those who can help support other students in financial need

$44 to sign up for all classes at once

To Bring When Dancing In-Person

Wear comfortable, soft clothing that does not bind and makes you happy. We will be dancing without shoes. Soft socks or slippers that stay on are fine as long as you can move in them. Any assistive devices or equipment that you need to feel stable. (We will have chairs available.) A blanket and/or a yoga mat and/or pillows to make a resting nook. Journaling or drawing supplies. Any assistive devices or equipment that you need to feel stable. (We will have chairs available.) A blanket and/or a yoga mat and/or pillows to make a resting nook. Journaling or drawing supplies.

To Gather In Your Home Studio

A single light source. Journaling or drawing supplies. A space to dance. A resting spot with a warm blanket, cushions or whatever feels cozy.

About Jen Gwirtz

Jennifer has been dancing and creating performances for over twenty years. She is fascinated with the essence of kinetic communication and its reverberations. Her current projects explore the elusive, erased female Jewish body and the aging body in motion.

She grew up in the Philadelphia suburbs where she studied ballet and attended Jewish day school. After a brief ballet career, she studied fine art at Washington University in St. Louis, where she first saw, created and worked backstage on experimental dance and theater. She was forever changed when she was chosen to be the student light board operator for Sankai Juku’s “Kinkan Shonen” in 1987, which began her studies of Butoh. Soon after moving to the Bay Area to pursue her masters degree in New Genres at San Francisco Art Institute, she studied with Butoh artist Yumiko Yoshioka. In the 1990s she created theatrical, movement-based experiments that challenged assumptions about performance for theaters, galleries and outdoor spaces, performing nationally and internationally. Her studies with master clowns Bill Irwin and Ron Campbell informed her collaborative work with Right Brain Performancelab, (1999-2017) which she co-founded with John Baumann as an experimental performance ensemble that straddled genres, drawing on dance, clown, puppetry and theater. Her studies with Anna Halprin sent her down a pathway that would lead her back to her Jewish roots. Gaga training has fed her research since the start of the pandemic. In 2018 she began the Kol B’Isha Project with a cast of Jewish women over 50. The company continued to explore remotely when the premiere was canceled due to the pandemic. The show, “Kol b’Isha/Voice Within Woman” premiered in April 2022 at Performance Works NW as an Alembic Co-Production. Jennifer is very honored to have been chosen as part of the Art/Lab fellowship cohort for 2021-2022. She is currently developing a movement research and performance practice in Portland, OR where she lives with her family.

Host or Publisher Eric Stern