ℭ𝔬𝔫𝔱𝔢𝔪𝔭𝔬𝔯𝔞𝔯𝔶 𝔇𝔞𝔫𝔠𝔢 𝔚𝔬𝔯𝔨𝔰𝔥𝔬𝔭

Be Heintzman Hope (Tio’tia:ke/Montréal)

Professional and community dancers are welcome. Presented in tandem with the DOG RISING performance by Clara Furey / Bent Hollow Compagnie on Jan 12 at 7 PM. Tickets available here $5-$50. 

Thursday, Jan 11
1:00-2:30 pm

Max capacity = 25

This workshop is offered for FREE by plastic orchid factory. If you have the means and would like to contribute to this community offering, we invite you to make a donation with your registration. Details at the checkout page. Contributions of all sizes are greatly appreciated! 

*Registration open until 10 PM on Thurs Jan 10*

This workshop plays with socialized notions of sexiness + the buddhist concept of the hungry ghost. Stripper Gollum serves as a mutable figure grappling with their feelings of emptiness, longings and the longings others have of them - in order to develop a compassionate humour towards both inner and outer hauntings.

THE HUNGRY GHOST

The hungry ghost in eastern philosophy represents the insatiable hunger alive in people often associated with craving and addiction. It is represented most popularly by the spirit character “no face” in the Hayao Miyazaki movie Spirited Away and is a focal point in Gabor Maté’s book In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction. The hungry ghost can also be found in the Gollum/Sméagul character of J.R.R. Tolkein’s novel, The Hobbit and its sequel The Lord of the Rings.

STRIPPER LINEAGE

Stripping has roots in many dancing cultures including the ballet, as an exchange between dancer and patron. It is a form of sex work intertwined with complex power dynamics, stigma, secrecy, self-employment, unstable employment, underground economy, the purchasing of pleasure, charm industry and so much more. It’s important to note that this form of indoor sex work sits on a different part of the safety spectrum than outdoor and survival sex work- although there may be overlap between the two.

ONE DAY, 1.5 HOURS

This workshop will begin with a work-out that draws from qigong, physiotherapy and wxmb cxre – a practice in breath, voice and movement to warm the body from the inside out. Participants will experience a spine, breath, and voice tuning that extends towards the limbs with a high level of physicality before diving into state based improvisations.

The research aspect of this workshop plays with the myth of personality and contradiction. After warming up, we will dive into state based research. We will turn this research into a personal choreography before collectively expanding upon it as a group phrase and living document of our time shared together. Be prepared to sweat!…and travel through time on your somatic journey as we explore different aspects of the self.

APPROACH

I invite people to be mindful when playing with these movements. I encourage working at the “resilient edge of resistance” - a term named by Chester Mainard. This term was formed in the context of erotic massage to describe a touch that isn’t too hard and isn’t too soft. How can we apply this term as a way of exploring movement? I’m not sure about you, but I imagine it in a way that balances pushing one's limits while taking care in the social context of a workshop setting.

COVID-19 / COLD + FLU SAFETY

It’s cold + flu season! If you wish to dance without a mask, please take a covid test to assure that you are negative. If you show signs of COVID, please don’t attend the workshop. If you have tested positive for COVID 19, be sure to have received a negative antigen test result before attending the workshop. Thank you!

About Be Heintzman Hope

Moving between sound and performance, Be Heintzman Hope is a facilitator of music, dance and embodiment ritual based between Tio’tia:ke/Mooniyang/Montréal and the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəyəm, Sḵwxwú7mesh and səlílwətaʔɬ peoples. Their practice bridges dance training with conflict resolution, healing, community arts. They hold workshops offering meditation, singing, dance as medicines to those on the front lines of their healing journeys. Their studies in eroticism, energetic boundaries, meditation, medicine, trauma, healing, illness, death are at the foundation of their practice. A larger part of this work is a quest to cocreate alternative economies and community-based structures of radical tenderness, care.

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