Colours in Contact: Contact Improv Skill Expansion Series

Lean into healthy challenge as a way to keep building skill, confidence, and flow in contact improv! Come deepen your contact improv practice with us! On November 9, 16, 23, 30 and Dec 7 from 7–9:30 pm, we’ll build on the fundamentals, refine our pathways, and open up more freedom, range, and creative choice in the dance. This five-week journey is designed for beginner/intermediate movers who already have some contact improv experience and want to expand their vocabulary, musicality, and improvisational voice in a playful, exploratory container. Together, we’ll explore: • Expanding options in shared movement and dialogue • Smoother, more responsive weight-sharing (with nuance and clarity) • Momentum, redirection, and dynamic range (from quiet to big) • Spirals, rolls, and more fluid floor-to-stand transitions • Intermediate lifts • Tracking habits and unlocking new possibilities • Bringing more artistry, risk, and ease into your dancing ✨ Bonuses for all participants: • Social time after each class • Free access to one jam per week throughout the series so you can play, practice, and grow alongside the community (6:30-9 pm on Wednesdays or 3-5 pm on Sundays at 805 Dovercourt Rd) • Connection to a wonderful and supportive community of movers! • Ask us for a coupon code if you've taken a Colours in Contact series ✨ Important information: • To help create the best experience for everyone, participants who miss two classes will be asked to join a future series instead. This allows you to build your skills alongside the group and ensures everyone progresses together. Please plan to attend a future series if you know you will have to miss more than one class. • Please note that refunds or exchanges are not available from 48 hours before the start of the series. • Advanced registration is required for this series • You will receive an introductory email within a couple days of the start of the first class Advanced registration required for this series; no drop-ins. You're welcome to send $175 to [email protected] ($150 to those who have already taken a Colours in Contact series) to avoid the eventbrite fee. Sign up today! We can’t wait to move with you! If you’re curious about contact improv and want to see what it looks like, what our community is like, or learn more about us, check out our Instagram and Facebook at @coloursincontact. --------------------------------------- About the Facilitators: Emma and Pablo co-founded Colours in Contact in 2023 with a shared vision: to build a warm, culturally diverse, beginner-friendly contact improv space in Toronto where people can move, explore, and express themselves freely. Emma grew up dancing, spending many years in ballet before falling in love with the freedom, play, and expressive possibilities of contact improv. She’s passionate about bringing people together, creating supportive spaces, and helping movers grow in confidence and creativity. Pablo, a Toronto-born mover with Guatemalan roots, brings a rich background in contact improv, muay thai, tai chi, yoga, partner dance, and authentic movement. His teaching is grounded in curiosity, play, and care, inviting dancers to explore what movement, support, and expression can mean for them. Together, they cultivate classes and jams that are beginner-friendly, inclusive, and rooted in the belief that everyone has a creative, expressive body waiting to be discovered. --------------------------------------- About Contact Improv: Contact Improvisation (CI) is a partner/solo/group-improvised dance style developed in 1972 by Steve Paxton and Nancy Stark Smith, heavily influenced by Aikido and Modern dance. Due to the open-ended nature of the dance, each new dancer can add to this pot of creativity. This has lead to various influences weaving in and out of the form. Some of those influences include but are not limited to Tango, Zen, Zouk, Contemporary, Ballet, Hip Hop, Qi Gong, Capoeira, Ballroom, Salsa and the list goes on. This is the beauty of CI: it can offer such an open fertile ground for exploration in expression and movement. Your voice in this dance is what will drive the creative freedom possible at Colours in Contact. --------------------------------------- Special Considerations: - Since Colours in Contact events involve a rolling point of contact and sliding, clothing that have zippers and buttons as well as jewellery are not permitted. Sleeveless shirts, shorts, skirts and slippery clothing are also not recommended. - Only non-glass water bottles are allowed in the studio as we dance barefoot. - Please avoid wearing perfumes or scented body care products in consideration for people with chemical sensitivities.