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The primary question that motivates the movement inquiry of Continuum is “What is a human body?”

A dancer’s instrument is the human body. The body is made up of 87% water and all communication and vital information within the body is exchanged through the fluid systems. Continuum emphasizes the primacy of the fluid system. One could say that Continuum is a study of the substance of which we are made. Research shows that water has archetypal properties and movements, and one of the many properties of water is that it naturally enlivens itself through spirals and undulating motions. For the dancer, Continuum is a study of how to experience, join with, and augment the natural processes of life happening within them. This can only lead to more refined movement, awareness, presence, and expression.
Continuum also studies our aquatic origins and connects us to the larger living biological universe. All life has been shaped by water.

 I had the privilege of working with Martha Graham and I remember her saying; “ We carry the memories of the dinosaurs and of all time in our cells.”

Scientific research is now discovering that water carries memory and we know that the process of evolution has been the process of bringing water to land. I remember Martha asking us to growl through exercises as we called forth the memory and qualities of a more primitive and primordial sense of movement. The primordial ground Martha Graham was moving toward is the very ground that Continuum explores in greater depth. It is this ground which connects us to all life. The biological culture that connects us at afundamental level is a more primary and powerful connection than the society and culture in which we live. Because dance is reflective of its time, Continuum offers a great opportunity for dancers to take advantage of the current discoveries of science and how movement itself becomes a powerful communicator, healer, and connection to the largerworld. 

CONTINUUM, DANCE, AND ACADEMIA 
We know that something is true and real in movement by the life force we access through the direct experience of doing it.

Continuum challenges the focalized, objectified view our culture has formed of the body. It challenges us to rethink our assumptions about the possibilities and limitations of the human body.
The motivating questions of the entire field of Modern Dance since Isadora Duncan and Loie Fuller through the more recent explorations of contact improvisation and release technique have been to ask: 

What is a human body capable of? What are the possibilities of the body that may be greater than the current understanding? What is the future of the body? How do our perceptions influence the way we move? How does our movement impact our thinking? How does our dance reflect our culture?The library for Dance is the human body. 

The research laboratory for Dance is the human body. Dance is fundamentally experiential. It will never be learned through an objectified discourse. Dance is an intersection of many spheres of thought, sensation, and emotion. The body is the medium through which dancers explore, research, and upon which they write. Dance is a field of artistry expressed through a highly complex living biological organism that carries a history of billions of years. Dance is the result of direct experience, and the deeper, more intimate relationship a dancer has with his/her body creates a more profound capacity to be authentic in the communication of movement. This is what Continuum offers.

CONTINUUM AND DANCE TRAINING
I see Continuum for dancers as a way to awaken the individual dancer to his or her own capacity for movement, expression, and creativity. Dance is often considered to be an outward expression culminating in a finished performance. Continuum is not a replacement for technical training, but instead an opportunity to study the very substance of which the human body is made. 

Continuum is a process of learning how to attend to the internal creative process alive within oneself at every moment. As musicians study sound, and visual artists study form and color to learn about the materials of their craft, a dancer can also benefit from studying the fundamental moving substance of which they are made. 

Continuum offers dancers the opportunity to explore new and highly refined realms of life moving, renewing and creating a new within their form.
In Continuum, breath, sound and primary movements bring the dancer to an essential level of understanding of how to work with one’s physical self. A dancer with experience in Continuum develops a more intimate and direct relationship to their physical, tissue and cellular self, resulting in a more dynamic range of movement and expressive capacity
as a performer. A dancer also develops a sensitive awareness of the flowing articulate parts of their body as well as the ability to recognize static dormant areas. Continuum practice encourages the cultivation of deep attention to oneself and others that are qualities necessary for opening the doors of creative possibility for the dance artist while maintaining health and reducing injuries.
As dancers become more self-aware at a physical sensory level, the result is often that they become more autonomous, self-referential, and confident. I have witnessed a corresponding development in the understanding and embrace of intellectual concepts among my students. When a dancer chooses a system or language of movement, (such as ballet, modern, jazz, yoga, or tai chi,) the exploration of Continuum enables them to bring more consciousness, embodiment and awareness to that particular language.

BREA TH
Breath is movement, and most dancers forget this essential fundamental reality. I have often described dance as visible breath. Most often dancers are in touch with movement as locomotion but forget that it is breath that animates movement. Continuum heightens a dancer’s awareness and participation in this fundamental expression of life. The possibility of both the quality and texture of breath is infinite. Often the pattern of our breath is habitual and unconscious. One’s breath will always reflect the state of one’s nervous system and the metabolic terrain in which the system resides. Continuum is an invitation to explore the possibilities of breath. The more breath one can bring to the body, the more movement possibilities one brings to the body. My experience of bringing Continuum to dance training is that it infiltrates traditional movement practices by enlivening the actual body tissue of a dancer allowing them to dance with more aliveness, creativity, and vitality

FORM AND DISSOLUTION, PERCEPTION, THINKING

Continuum is a study of form and dissolution. In very simple terms, Continuum is explicating the internal biological process and model of a cell’s activity in the body. When a cell needs something it moves from a state of gel to a state of sol. In other words, when a cell needs nourishment from its surroundings, it softens its boundaries so that what it needs may enter. When it receives what it needs, the cell returns to a state of gel (form) informed with necessary nourishment. Continuum offers a practice of intentionally deconstructing form and habitual patterns in the body so that new information, nourishment and possibility may enter the body. Repetitive patterns of movement create very specific skills, but the repetition also creates boundaries and closed systems that prevent the flow of new information. 

Continuum offers a healthy challenge to any structured training method where the primary effort is to learn repetitive patterns. 

If a dancer can practice and become aware of releasing form in the body, he or she can gain the skills to resource him or herself with new information and nourishment as they return informed to the traditional form of training. The result is more embodied, full, and voluminous dancing.

I have witnessed extraordinary leaps in technical progress by the students who have been working with Continuum. What seemed foreign to them initially became a resource for them as they experienced progress both physically and intellectually. Often, after only one semester of introducing concepts of Continuum, I have observed enormous shifts in coordination, fluidity, volume and presence among my students. In my choreography class I offered Continuum as the preparation for improvisation. As a result there was an enormous outpouring of enthusiasm, creativity, and excitement about making dances. Continuum also addresses our methods of perception. It explores and questions our methods of sensory perception as well as our cultural habits of seeing. The expansion of
one’s sensory awareness increases a dancers capacity to express greater nuance and access more refined movement. As sensory skills are developed, I have also observed a corresponding increase in proprioceptive skills.
Continuum investigates how the patterns of our thought relate to the patterns of our movement. A patterned movement or habitual movement corresponds to habitual thinking and ways of perceiving. Movement is considered to be information and if the information is always the same, there is less nourishment, less perception, and less opportunities for new thought and discovery within the system.

HEALTH
The more dancers understand their bodies as unfolding, evolving, biological processes, the more sensitive and skilled they will become in regard to their own physical health. Fundamental health is important to the dancer because they must maintain a state of health that allows them to meet the demands and rigors of their profession. Continuum offers the perspective that true health is based on adaptability and flexibility so that an
static stable state of repetition and sameness creates closed systems with less possibility of nourishment. A closed system has less resources to adapt to challenging situations. With fewer resources, a system often adapts to stressful challenges by developing an illness or injury.
A primary focus of exploration in Continuum is the connective tissue in the body. Our entire body is encompassed by connective tissue. and every part of our body, including our blood is composed of connective tissue. Research is suggesting that the speed of communication through the connective tissue in the body may be faster than the Central Nervous System. Connective tissue touches everything in the body and is 70 percent water. Enlivening this fluid system brings an increased vitality and greater possibility for better communication and healthy adaptation within the system. This is important information for a dancer because supporting health and quickening the response and possibilities of the body to communicate is necessary to maintain an active and productive career.

ARTISTRY
Continuum increases an essential quality of presence in a dancer as they train, rehearse, and perform. It cultivates a deep rapport with one’s creativity in a way that enhances a dancer’s skill both as an interpreter and a performer. To understand the body as movement rather than the body as form opens the dancer to an infinite realm of ever present movement paths and choices. In choreography, I have found Continuum deepens the responses and increases the creative possibilities of the choreographer. In some ways it is as though the choreographer joins with and discovers the movement possibilities already present, rather than feeling the pressure of ‘inventing’ movement.
I have often said that my goal as a dance artist is to become so permeable that the movement I make is deeply felt and known by the audience. I have a powerful desire to believe in a dancer as a portal to realms of expression rather than as a machine or instrument of achievement. The practice of Continuum offers a context in which we can explore more permeable states of connection that allow for the flow of information to the forms through which we function. To bring this skill and ongoing inquiry to the form and artistry of dance is an enormous asset. Continuum offers great support to the dance artist who has chosen dance out of a very deep longing to express the interconnectedness of life and move in ways that reveal as Martha Graham described ‘the inner landscape of the soul.’