Spacetuning. A Practice of Co-Becoming

I am my own space. I will be space for you, and you for me. We will gather in this room to offer ourselves and the other a space that listens and responds. We meet the challenge of embodying a practice that shapeshifts with the participants’ body-selves. To respond and be response-able. We are aware that bodies materialize – become – within relations, that the body and space share a story of formation. Space and body tune and tone one another, hold one another. What kind of space are we crafting here with our presences and engagements, for oneself and for others? Space is always an affective doing. We invite into play on the porous boundary of self and space, where the self-process becomes part of the we-process and the other way around (if and when did they become separated?). If you dare to open the surfaces of your cells, diverse body tones field into space, touch others and re-form the boundaries of our practice and inform what becomes emergent. I add a heightened squeal. Here, space can also ooze into you. Re-pattern you. If you decide to let it. What kind of space do you need for becoming…?

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From March 10–14, ARS Art Factory Studios 98 and 53 will transform into inclusive spaces for embodied being and engagement. Daily somatic artistic research sessions focused on contemporary embodiment – Spacetuning. A Practice of Co-Becoming – are held and open for joining.
Spacetuning. A practice of co-becoming is the 2nd artistic research project of Joanna Kalm’s doctoral studies at Estonian Academy of Arts.

Rooted in body-based self- and other-perception, the practice brings attention to the materialization process of body-selves in relation to the environment and offers possibilities for alternate ways of co-becoming. The practice is embodied by dance artists Helina Karvak, Joanna Kalm, Nele Kotli, Laura Kvelstein, and Rasmus Stenager Jensen. Together, they take on the challenge of embodying a space that listens and responds, capable of transforming alongside the body-selves present.

The practice welcomes diverse forms of participation guided by an individual’s perception of the moment, while inviting awareness of one’s role as a witness, experiencer, and co-creator.

Schedule of practice room:

10.03 3pm open space*, 4-6pm practice, 6pm open space

11.03 3pm open space, 4-6pm practice, 6pm open space

12.03 11am open space, 12-2pm practice, 2pm break, 3pm open space, 4-6pm practice, 6pm open space
13.03 3pm open space, 4-6pm practice, 6pm open space

14.03 11am open space, 12-2pm practice, 2pm break, 3pm open space, 4-6pm practice, 6pm open space

*The room is open one hour before and after practice in support of calm and gradual arrival into embodied presence and the space, affording free time for being-engaging and for becoming acquainted with the surroundings.

Register your participation: https://fienta.com/et/o/5991

 Spacetuning. A practice of co-becoming is based on somatic self- and other-awareness, supports embodied being-engagement and somatic sense-making, which in turn grounds the collaborative process of how the practice framework forms and is formed in relations. One of the key focuses of research and practice is response-ability – to one’s own process and to the group members as well as to spatial dynamics. Given that the body and the environment are co-emergent and in intra-active relationships, to what extent do we allow ourselves to truly participate in this co-becoming? Do we know how and dare to affect the becoming of the environment with our own processes? And to what extent is the environment (as a socio-material process) capable of considering and responding to the differences of its participants? Thus, this practice is an attempt to move beyond the invisible and silent boundary (is it real or habitual?) between oneself and space, where personal processes are kept within (to what extent is personal really personal?), and where the environment tends to perceive and respond only to a small extent. It is an attempt to move from embodied presence and awareness to engagement with – to inclusive action, response and co-becoming, where the body-self is more broadly involved.

Spacetuning. A practice of co-becoming is the 2nd artistic research project of Joanna Kalm’s doctoral studies at Estonian Academy of Arts. Kalm’s artistic research draws on somatic co- and self-regulation theory and is grounded in the organism’s capacity for self-organization—manifesting both at the level of the body-self and the group—with the aim of co-creating inclusive, body-based practices and spaces. One focus of the research is to examine the possible modes of materialization of the body-self, grounded in attentive somatic self-listening and the organically dynamic processes of the body-self (somatic agency). The second focus addresses the intra-active relationship between somatic embodiment and practice conceived (apparatus), asking: what kind of practice supports body-based co- and self-regulation, and how does creative somatic embodiment shape the functioning of practice and shared spaces? Kalm approaches somatic embodiment through posthumanist and new materialist philosophy, as well as through theories of cellular consciousness and organism-oriented ontology.