From mud to mud

Following the theme of 'birth and death, today's main them was the notion of being a created object, and being initially ignorant of one's purpose, working it out as a group by a series of experimental responses to an original sculpt.

Today's warm-up consisted of some sound and movement.  Each person chose one sound and one movement.  This became their personal 'motif', they did not change it, but changed the texture of the sound by altering its tempo, pitch, or volume.  What they could do, is to group together and join with another person or people.  This created an interesting piece of music and movement, as the sound drifted, shifting but remaining true to it's original form.  In this picture, the group was all walking behind and reflecting the sound and movement of one member.  A fifth member chose to remain with his own sound and movement, which was not altered during the piece.  This of course is allowed.

By the end of the piece, the group decided to break the rules, and take up different movements and sounds.  At this point the warm up broke down, as there was confusion about whether rule breaking is ok or not.  It is actually allowed, but it was an interesting experiment while the rules were being followed!

Creating with intent

For the main part of the session, we played a game in which everyone started lying down on the floor, as mud.  At some point, one person would 'come to life', and become the Creator.  They would wordlessly sculpt the other group members into an object, or a set of objects.  In this picture the group are being sculpted, at this point not having any idea about what they are supposed to be.  

Once the  creator has finished forming the object(s) into shape, they 'breathed life' into the object.  At this point it started to move.

As the group members experimented with different sounds and modes of movement, they imagined what they might be.  In this picture, the group gradually came to realise that it was a merry-go-round in a children's fair.

 What I was interested in during the game was the process of experimenting with modes of being - and wondering, as created objects, what our purpose was.  Also, in the case of the creator, what was their response while the group experimented, and made guesses, sometimes right, sometimes wrong, about what they were supposed to be.

If the group really had no idea, then they would create some sort of cohesive movement.  Rules may be implied in the original positions, such as in one case, the sculpts were placed facing outwards from four corners.  Each person sensed from this that we were not supposed to interact; they all responded differently to the positions they were placed in, yet all obeyed the rule of no interaction. 

In this sculpt, the group were bell ringers, and again, this was guessed following the movement suggested by the original position, to move up and down in different intervals.

These games are good for experimenting with sound and movement, but also for continuing our work with group cohesion, as each individual member, as well as finding and testing their own hypotheses about what they are, also responds to the actions of other group members.  

As human's, unlike other animals, we often question the purpose of our existence.  Why are we born?  What to our parents/teachers/bosses etc want from us?  As parents/teachers/bosses, we communicate with varying degrees of success, what it is that we want from our children/students/employees.  We hope that they will understand our intention.  We hope that we correctly interpret the intention of others, when they indicate that they want something from us.  The guesses that we make depend on the clarity of the original instruction, along with our comprehensive skills.  That's just the cognitive stuff.

What is happening emotionally?  What happen's when we don't make ourselves clear and people misinterpret us?  Do we get frustrated?  angry?  Do we blame them?  Ourselves?  Might their interpretation of our request be as valid as our request and thus acceptable, or do we stick rigidly to a request and insist that only the correct interpretation is valid?  What happens when a complete lack of understanding occurs?  Is there fear?  Do people worry about 'letting someone down'?

There are many many more questions that are posed during this game, but ultimately, it's success, as in all of the work that we do, is based on how much people are enjoying themselves.