All images: HollowBody Workshop at KongsiKL (2018), by Joie Koo.
Workshop
October 25, 11am-12:30pm
AC Arts, Level 3, Rehearsal Studio, 39 Light Square, Kaurna Yarta
$30 (+ booking fee)
Led by Kuik Swee Boon, Founder and Artistic Director of T.H.E Dance Company, the workshop will include improvisational prompts and tools to guide participants to arrive at nuanced states of physical and physiological connectedness.
About HollowBody:
HollowBody™️ is the signature methodology and movement philosophy advocated by founding artistic director and main choreographer of Singapore’s T.H.E Dance Company, Kuik Swee Boon; it is the current methodology with which the dance artists at T.H.E train. Neither a mere movement aesthetic nor an existential state of being, it is an experiential process, utilising improvisational tools to guide practitioners towards a heightened physiological awareness that resonates in their movement choice, approach, and expression.
HollowBody™️ is based on the understanding of the body as the foundation of our world. As a vessel for thoughts, emotions and energy, our embodied experiences and knowledge transcend language and logic. The HollowBody™️ methodology seeks to establish in its practitioner a level of trust and access that can surface these deep impulses and needs, and unearth an innate connectivity between mind, heart, and body. With the practitioner’s curiosities, potential, and limitations becoming wholly available to themselves, self-understanding and creative expression unfold.
Today, long-term practice of the HollowBody™️ methodology has fed naturally into T.H.E’s creation and performance voice. We at T.H.E believe that with HollowBody™️, dance and movement can be embraced as a fundamental pillar in life that offers a deep connection to the body, and in turn, the world.
What to expect:
Participants will be given improvisational prompts and tools, guided to listen to their instinct and impulses, and to rediscover movement as a unique expression and identity.
Experience level:
Suitable for professional and semi-professional dance artists, dancers, full-time dance students aged 18 and above, and movement enthusiasts who are comfortable with improvisation.
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The Human Expression (T.H.E) Dance Company was founded in 2008 by Artistic Director Kuik Swee Boon. Rooted firmly in Singapore yet universal in its perspective, T.H.E's contemporary dance works reveal the body as a medium for exploring and celebrating the human condition.
Dance artists at T.H.E are immersed in the Company's signature methodology, HollowBody™️, which guides them to access their deeper instincts and impulses through movement. The Company's movement vocabulary is distinct in its intensely personal aesthetics, yet thrilling in its diversity. Driven by a sincere desire to uncover the intricate, complex and oft-times overlooked dimensions of human existence, the Company's incisive observations on the human condition and its original creations are an essential mirror to the issues and rhythms of contemporary life.
As one of Singapore's seminal contemporary dance companies, T.H.E has performed and toured at many major and prestigious festivals in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Laos, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, China, India, France, Italy, Poland, Denmark, Latvia, United Arab Emirates, Australia, and New Zealand.
Based on its vision of contemporary dance as a medium for nurturing human potential, T.H.E has also actively initiated numerous platforms to engage young artists and the wider public. Since it was founded, the Company also started its semi-professional wing, T.H.E Second Company, which identifies and mentors dance artists who aspire to reach a professional standard of contemporary dance. In 2010, T.H.E also founded the cont·act Contemporary Dance Festival (previously known as the M1 Contact Contemporary Dance Festival) – the country's first annual contemporary dance festival to showcase local and international artists. The Company also regularly runs public classes, workshops, and customised programmes for schools and the community.
Kuik Swee Boon
Founder and Artistic Director of T.H.E Dance Company (est. 2008) and its annual cont·act Contemporary Dance Festival (est. 2010), Kuik Swee Boon danced in Compañia Nacional de Danza (CND) from 2002—2007, performing in works by renowned choreographers such as Nacho Duato, Jiri Kylian, and Ohad Naharin. Prior to CND, he danced in Singapore People’s Association Dance Company and Singapore Dance Theatre. A 2007 Young Artist Award recipient, he was nominated for the Benois De La Danse Award in 2003, and selected for the 2021—2023 Fellowship Programme with the International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA).Under Swee Boon’s direction, T.H.E has become a seminal dance company that trains in his HollowBody™️ methodology, with a repertoire of works that has toured many international festivals. Even when the pandemic hit, his 360° virtual reality adaptation of PheNoumenon (2019), amongst other digital projects, made its rounds to Italy and Israel in 2021. Most recently, he was commissioned by Esplanade’s da:ns festival 2022 to create Infinitely Closer, which also marked the opening of the new Singtel Waterfront Theatre.
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Kuik Swee Boon
Founder and Artistic Director of T.H.E Dance Company (est. 2008) and its annual cont·act Contemporary Dance Festival (est. 2010), Kuik Swee Boon danced in Compañia Nacional de Danza (CND) from 2002—2007, performing in works by renowned choreographers such as Nacho Duato, Jiri Kylian, and Ohad Naharin. Prior to CND, he danced in Singapore People’s Association Dance Company and Singapore Dance Theatre. A 2007 Young Artist Award recipient, he was nominated for the Benois De La Danse Award in 2003, and selected for the 2021—2023 Fellowship Programme with the International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA).
Under Swee Boon’s direction, T.H.E has become a seminal dance company that trains in his HollowBody™️ methodology, with a repertoire of works that has toured many international festivals. Even when the pandemic hit, his 360° virtual reality adaptation of PheNoumenon (2019), amongst other digital projects, made its rounds to Italy and Israel in 2021. Most recently, he was commissioned by Esplanade’s da:ns festival 2022 to create Infinitely Closer, which also marked the opening of the new Singtel Waterfront Theatre.
