Touch Talk: The Pleasure Patchwork

Join Rosalind and Katherina around the Dorich House dining table.  The talk will begin with a somatic invitation to touch, fumble and feel the Pleasure Patchwork, which will be laid out on the table. Following time for feedback, Rosalind will discuss how the blanket relates to her PhD research on touch and the vocabulary used in the dance of Contact Improvisation. She will share her research findings, including reflections on how people can navigate bubbling emotions, thoughts, desires, discomfort and pain, through how touch is embodied and applied. Rosalind will also talk about the vocabulary of touch techniques developed through her research that stands to enhance empathy, agency, presence, consensual awareness and compassionate and expressive communication skills. While initially designed for dancers, Rosalind’s vocabulary proposes relevance for how touch is experienced and applied in health and social care, in design, in daily social interactions, and for how we relate to the environment.

Rosalind Holgate Smith is a Dance Artist and Choreographer working between the UK and Berlin. She creates performances and installations that explore intimacy between people, place and the environment. In her art and teaching Rosalind takes inspiration from Contact Improvisation and somatic training in Body-Mind CenteringⓇ, Skinner Release Technique, Authentic Movement, Martial arts and outdoor dancing.  Over the past 5 years, Rosalind has been working on a PhD at Kingston University, investigating how touch makes possible encounters with Otherness, and the vocabulary of touch used in Contact Improvisation. https://rosalindholgate-smith.com/ 

Katharina Krenkel is a crochet sculptor and graphic artist based in Saarbrucken, south Germany. She works with lines of the thread, the ink brush, the pencil, and embroidery needle. Her art which takes time, explores everyday challenges and prompts a humorous engagement with the body, the domestic, order and history. https://www.katharina-krenkel.de.  Follow on Instagram: @rosalindholgatesmith, @kittys_fuzzy_world, @pleasure_patchwork