Kurt Koegel

Kurt Koegel has taught for festivals, universities and dance companies including Ultima Vez, Rosas, Gallotta Danse, P.A.R.T.S., SNDO, EDDC, SEAD, and the Korean National University of the Arts. In September 2007 he will direct a new Masters Program in Contemporary Dance Pedagogy at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst, Frankfurt am Main.

What do you teach? I teach Movement Technique; Contact and Partnering Skills in Group Performance Improvisation; and a course titled “Compositional Mind” that dissolves the barrier between Improvisation and Choreography.

To explore themes or working with a company on a project I combine methods and approaches; we might begin with “mobile stability” doing yoga and movement repatterning, proceed to contact improvisation, and finish with a powerful solo combination that moves in and out of the floor. Exploring Interval and Proximity we may research: changing of level and displacement in space to give richness and texture, “fitting into” the negative space around the body, using surface contact or grips without becoming stuck together, and sensing the expressive forms created with a partner.
What do you expect from students? That they ...