When I begin work in the studio, I often start by playing with a gesture, a shape or a simple movement sequence without any text. It may be in response to a theme, an idea, a fragmentary image, a memory. It may not be in response to any theme. At times I score the improvisations, providing a simple structure to work from, such as ‘lead from the top of the head’ or ‘right toe as primary mover’ or ‘attention to gaze: intimate, middle distance or infinite’ or ‘be asymmetrical at all times’ or ‘eyes as limb’ or ‘reverse impulse’. Sometimes I work in complete darkness for a while, or work with eyes closed, or ‘fishtail’ – cheat with my eyes open briefly in order to orient myself in space, or move from one state to the other. At times I focus on what feels nice and what is interesting to explore. At other times I attend to patterns that have been/are being created in space.  An image may arise following a particular gesture, which I may ignore or respond to. I may become bored, and if I do I work to maintain or re-generate interest.

As I continue, I build material by choosing to repeat, sustain or develop a particular idea. For example, I may choose to explore one gesture further, repeating it, extending it, slowing it down, playing with tempo, duration, spatial relationship, and so on. Images, texts and movement sequences are gathered and established in this way. Particular expressive moments may resonate or stay with me somehow – I will return to them again and again. I choose them. These ‘choices’, however, often occur in the moment of physical action. They are not always consciously planned, but seem to come from an intuitive, feeling place.

Is there some biological process that supports my experience of my body and its ability to uncover authentic and engaging material? My body seems to be leading the way in these moments. It assists me by gathering and collecting objects, elements, themes for performance. How is it doing that? Can neuroscience provide a theory for this practice?

I continue to facilitate research workshops with improvisers and performers – the latest block runs through December and is focussing towards memory and image-based work – how we collect, embody, select and incorporate material through our body’s ‘internal preference system’ (neuroscientist Antonio Damasio from ‘Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain, p. 179).

At various stages of the session, we stop and discuss what’s happening for the participants. I record these discussions, and later, transcribe them. This process is painstaking, time-consuming, but fascinating, not least because it introduces a whole other set of questions for me about my own language, my instructions, the way I and others talk about movement practice and movement experience, and the relationship between language and the ‘doing’ of the work. It also enables me to analyse the discussions in a different way – for example, I isolate chunks of text according to categories: ‘brain’, ‘embody’, ‘image’, ‘self’, ‘other’, ‘pathway’, ‘choice’ and so on, and I begin to group ideas and themes this way. It starts to tie in with my reading around categories, taxonomies, and the body’s role in assisting with decision-making. I turn to George Lakoff – ‘What is there that is common to the way all human beings think?’ (Women, Fire and Dangerous Things p. xi – what a book!) and wonder: is there some common ground  amongst makers, improvisers, theatre practitioners, about how we perceive and conceptualise our process?

Here are a few of the key words and phrases that I identified in the transcripts.

The Head - Head/conscious(ness/thinking/frontal lobe/thought/knowing/neural/physiology/ brain

Decisions, Decisions - Decisions/choice/choosing/selecting

Connective Tissue - Connections/pathways/synapses/relationships between brain and body, body and brain in describing experiences

My Story - Narrative

 Acts Of Creation - Author/observer; maker/watcher; the relationships between (and definitions of) these.

I See You - Eyes/gaze/looking/seeing

Guts - Embody/embodied/body/skin/flesh/guts/visceral

Senses - Senses/feeling-sense/emotions

Training Vs Performance - Performance/performative; training; ‘sats’

Movement Vocabularies - Gesture/gestural; movement vocabulary(s)

Who Am I In This? - Self, awareness of self, self in relation to other

Language - Describing thinking: ‘I’m going: “How do I do this?”’     Active voice/passive voice

The Container (And Other) Schema(s) - Internal/external; outside/inside (the ‘kinesthetic image schemas’ referred to by Lakoff p 271 onwards; the ‘container schema’)

The Nature of Instructions - How instructions are interpreted; language used; physical responses to abstracted (a quality, an expression, an essence, a feeling)  vs specific physical instructions (use your eye as a limb; follow your hand; left pinkie as primary mover)

 Lists - Repertoire, lists and categories, patterns, habits, constraints

Image - Images that arise in the mind, pre-empting or allowing

Thanks to past and present participants (note excellent use of alliteration) Kelly Alexander, Debra Batton, Penny Baron, Vanessa Chapple, Dani Cresp, Andrew Gray, Dan Goronsky, Peter Fraser, Bronwyn Kamasz, Leesa Nash, Stefanie Robinson, Sally Smith.