Dance Contact: A conversation on Tango and Improvisation
Harris Hoke 0:00
So you've done a ton of tango, you've hosted milongas in Buenos Aires?
Alexandre Barthélémy 0:07
So I started to host milonga in Paris, then in Berlin, a few other places. I mean, traditional milonga. I mean, yeah, mostly in Paris. And then Berlin I did some interpretive milongas with Tango and contact improvisation dance. And in Buenos Aires after, like before the pandemic, and a bit after the pandemic, we did some great alternative tango parties.
Harris Hoke 0:39
so for you the what makes it alternative is not necessarily that it's like Neo tango, or like you're dancing to different music or whatever, is that it's got the contact improv aspect to it. Or that it's in conversation with Contact Improv.
Alexandre Barthélémy 0:58
I started to dance contact improv in Paris, I was already dancing Contact Improv since a while when I was enjoying the Tango. And I was already doing sometimes milongas with I was putting alternative music in my milongas but at some point, I realized that every time I was going to contact impro jams to practice contact improv right before going to milonga because in Berlin you can danse contact every night, and you can dance tango every night, so I was going to the contact and then I was going to some very nice tango parties. So I was realizing that in my body, I was actually more flexible, more aware of more, like they're just dancing better and just getting better to my partner in the milonga dancing tango because of warming up in the contact jam. So that was always amazing to me to realize that so I started to propose, okay, let's organize a contact jam. And then second point, it would be a tango. And so I was renting out a huge flat. At the moment, I was lucky to have a huge flat in Berlin to work with software developers for my music project. And then I say in the space, okay, let's have a contact jam, and then after a milonga. I mean, it was not a big space to dance. But still, it was a very nice space. And, and it was really nice. And at some point I decided to put it even further was to organize an interlacement, I don't know if you can say interlacing, of tango, contact Tango contact like the one after the other. And my point is that it's 20 years is more than two decades of 25 years, or maybe even for two years. I don't know that some people around the world and maybe, especially in Europe, or in Argentina are trying to mix to make a mixture of tango and contact. And for me, it was never easy or never obvious how to do that. I'm too passionate about Tango to just say okay, let's mix it with whatever, you know. So I was always wanting to to dance with Tango, I didn't want to say okay, let's mix it and blend it into something else. So for me, I still wanted to do the real thing.
Harris Hoke 3:19
That's interesting, because I think we're coming at it from kind of different places. There are some people I've talked to in the Contact Improv or fusion dance world. And they're they they their focus is on sort of tearing down structure.
Alexandre Barthélémy 4:23
In fusion and also ...?
Harris Hoke 3:33
Yeah, in Fusion dance and in Contact Improv, sometimes. The focus is on like, we want to have as little structure as possible, like we want to free ourselves in the moment. And I think there I can see that perspective. But for me, I tend to I really appreciate that like the unique contact improv framework the idea of like, this is a sort of game right and anything could happen and like focus in the moment and then really focus on that flow. And then when you but for me what contact improv is missing is almost like this language like Tango has or Zouk has or any particular style has that enables these more complicated interesting things, but you I also see how sometimes with like, the form people get too focused on it and they get bogged down.
Alexandre Barthélémy 4:26
I think the equilibrium of focusing on the state of being in the dance which is more like the postmodern then especially contact and on the other side, focusing on the form... I think there is a nice balance in between, to find a nice balance between some form but not only the form and some state of being in how I feel, how I feel how I feel in the dance, we have also some form not only how to stop I feel when just doing casual movement. So in a way contact is really, really is a philosophy of the dance like, postmodern dance, about focusing on the state of being and not giving a fuck about the form, which I really like this philosophy, I'm really into it, I love contact, I absolutely love exactly how you describe contact, the fact that there is, you don't want to have a structure you want to to be completely free. And, and, and that philosophy of contact is pretty new. I mean, it started in the 60s. And it's something very, very amazing. And, of course, there's a lot of technique you can learn actually, it's very interesting to learn to be a good contact dancer and to actually learn the technique because there's still some technique. But without form, it's hard to move. At some point, you still have form. If you just follow the point of contact, there are a lot of forms in Contact Improv that come from themselves, from the point of contact, which is beautiful. And you can always adapt some form. For example, I since I started to learn Brazilian Zouk, since one year, I was surprised that when I was dancing in the contact gym, I was starting to do some kind of movement that I got from Zouk, just without thinking about it that was coming up because I'm learning a lot of Zouk forms, and that came in my dance in the contact jams. And I was surprised about it, like, Oh, I know, I made this movement, and I like it. So it's, it's a way to realize that, okay, that even in a dance without form, I can adapt some forms, and it's actually nourishing my dance. So usually in the Contact jams, I realized that a lot of times, people from dancing coming from other backgrounds, who are going into fully in this philosophy of having no forms, no thinking nothing. They still have some forms. And yeah, and it's amazing to dance with them. And sometimes more, these regular addict to Contact Improv jams that are always there that you know how they they are already. Maybe less surprise, because everybody already knows each other, and they dance with each other. So whenever we have a new person with other forms of dance in their background, you can feel it in in their body... I think it's really, it's really good, this influence of dance styles on each other. But I was always more interested to interlace Tango and Contact than to propose a mixture and also to teach. You know, because there are a lot of people who not a lot, but few of people who say, Okay, I'm going to teach you how to mix Tango and Contact. But to me, it sounds more like Contact with the perfume of tango, there's not really Tango anymore. It's my feeling. I mean, like when they're in Berlin, and there are some people who do that's amazing and there are amazing parties, like it's good. It's just my proposal is yeah, it's different is like, I really want people to learn Tango, I really want people to learn some Contact, and they will figure out if they want to mix it or not. And already the influence between the two dance styles is totally amazing. If they mix it the way they do it in the social dance. And actually, the definition of a social dance is to let the people play, to invite them to dance. And that's not to tell them, "Hey, this is how you mix, Tango and Contact", you know? So it's funny. So social dance proposal is more, I think, logic to in the process for dance proposal, it's more logic to say to the people, okay, we're going to have this party, we're going to put some tango, some contact and we're gonna have some dancers of both backgrounds. And now you're going to maybe experiment for yourself what it means for you, if you feel like just having this inspiration or going further into mixing them the way you want with the vibe and warming up in the parties that I see beautiful things happening. I do have some friends in Buenos Aires that I think are the first to my mind, who really find a methodology of how to mix Tango and Contact, because myself I don't concern myself with how to mix Tango and Contact. I don't I don't really mix it. I do a bit of Tango, and I go to Contact from Tango and I go from Contacts to Tango and Tango to Contact and and I go from one to the other. And so sometimes I happen to mix it but I'm not advanced in this research enough, so I want to stay humble and not say, "Hey, I know perfectly how to mix these styles". But the truth is that I organize a lot of events Interlacing Tango and Contact, but I'm not pretending always to mix it and how you people should make sense. But in Buenos Aires, there are Irina Jabsa and Guadalupe Santiago, my friends from there, two amazing dancers. They started to really... I think they were teaching that a bit. It was actually Tango with three people. They were making some workshops about dance with three, with the arms and the way to relate especially between two of the dancers. And this upper body is the language of contact.
Harris Hoke 4:41
This is not one leader and two followers.
Alexandre Barthélémy 6:40
There's no leader and follower. Yeah. And from what I understood actually from what they do, and I was dancing with them some time and I really love it it, it was amazing. And all the Tango structure, legs structure is just Tango steps Tango steps, sacadas, just Tango steps, in the leg structure. And in the upper part of the body and the organization and improvisation of the dance was really from Contact but still with the axis of the of the axis of the vertebra. They have one video about it. I should find it. I would have liked to to film that more. I should ask them. I was dancing with them. And I wanted that to be on video. But it didn't happen. But they did with I mean they have they still exploring, they have different ways to do it. But there is a way that I remember I was dancing with them a few times and I suppose that was what they were teaching. And that's the first time in my life, I realized, oh, wow, these people, they start to have something that is starting to look like something clear about how they mix Tango and Contacts. The down part was Tango steps and the upper part of the body was still vertical, but relating in more Contact way, it will be the spatial relation between the three moving between each other and stuff in a very creative way. And the steps kind of go very fruity. I mean, there were very few, very few times we bump the feet on each other because it's all very graceful, and it looks graceful. And I was amazed how great we could look even, so it was completely improvised just with six legs. And I was like, they're really good at that. It might be complex to... I don't know how they teach it. I should have went to the workshop, but it's the first time I saw mixture of Tango with Contact with was worth to say, Okay, this is a class and you can try to understand.
Harris Hoke 12:07
you said before something I wanted to follow up on like is like, what what in your mind defines something as Tango as opposed to like some other dance or like Contact Improv?
Alexandre Barthélémy 12:18
So yeah, so it's an interesting question. For me, Tango, I like to say that it's a very, very specific way to dance Contact.
Harris Hoke 12:26
Gotcha. So it's like a subset?
Alexandre Barthélémy 12:28
Yeah, yeah, actually, in a way. I mean, Contact is more recent than all the disciplines, I'm going to talk about, but in a way, it's more general. So you can analyze not historically of course, but if you want to speak about movement, I would say Contact is like a big universe of movement. I mean, you can say even animals playing together or rolling so it's already contact you know, they do in contact where the goal is to feel like puppies. And so I mean, when you see two puppies rolling over each other, you're like, Oh, this is Contact Improvisation.
Harris Hoke 13:05
That's why you say they suddenly discovered it right? Not invented.
Alexandre Barthélémy 13:09
That's one of the reason why I think they say that yeah.
Some people for example, who do osteopathy which is not even a dance, Osteopathy. Osteopathy comes from the US actually. But yeah, it's like, it's a different branch. Yeah, but it's like really like fixing your your skeletal muscles and stuff and actually branch on different ways. European osteopathy and Americans osteopathy. I mean, I didn't try you Americans Osteopathy, by the way. I know a lot of people doing European Osteopathy, especially dancers. And I was surprised to hear that some students in Osteopathy were initiating themselves to Contact to know how to better connect and all the clients and how to behave. So a lot of disciplines are looking at contact improvisation to get better connection to get better connection with the person they are counteracting to. So in a way, when you put the two feet in front of each other and you limit your movement to just one step on the side, or one step forward, one step in the back, you kind of say, Okay, I'm going to limit Contact Improvisation into super, super specific, limited way of dancing Contact, where only one is leading the other one. But actually, you still have the presence and the pressure and you communicate your presence through through this I mean, you can hold behind but you sometime in tango, we have this milonguero style where you actually push so it's kind of a specific way of dancing contact. Because
Harris Hoke 14:51
You're creating the shared intention [towards each other]
Alexandre Barthélémy 14:55
Sometimes. you have more opposition, like you have in Swing. And so you have all those influences but you can analyze them in terms of contact language, and actually when I use the contact language, or when I teach Tango to contact people, it's much more logical. Because you can say these are the building blocks and when you teach Tango to Contact dancers they are super fast to learn (most of the time). So yeah, you could say, if I would make a pilot with a particular physics, I would say like you have the mass and the universe and the all the stars and everything. And then you have some time you have a singularity, which is a super big mass and you have a black hole, which goes into another space. And you could say that Tango creates a singularity into the Contact universe, that kind of disconnection in one direction, which is super limited and which is super narrow. And then this opens up into a connection, which is more fusional than any other dance in the world. Because I don't know I mean, even in Zouk Yeah, in Zouk is amazing, too. So now I say my brain is kind of kind of challenged by the discovery of Zouk because all my ideas about Zouk and about dance and Contact and Tango I'm telling you right now, it feels that they are still challenged by Zouk. So maybe what I'm saying in six months or in one year, I changed my mind but but what I feel is that at the moment, I don't know if there is so many dance that is as fusional as tango in a way that you really have one person leading and following. So it's like the follower is kind of puppet of the leader. But it's it's creating a deep connection like one person with four legs and the fusion which is 100%. And this 100% fusion is making all this singularity where you go from the Contact so so that's why going back from the singularity into the Contact and mixing Tango and Contact is kind of weird, because it's kind of going away from the specificity of the Tango.
Harris Hoke 17:01
Yeah, you can't have as as much of that synchronicity that fusion, right. There's an I've danced a number of dance styles. Tango is the one that I feel like I'm most in the other person's body.
Alexandre Barthélémy 17:16
Exactly. Yeah.
Harris Hoke 17:17
It's like it sometimes almost feels like I'm like, like my consciousness is inside them.
Alexandre Barthélémy 17:24
I mean, it's very subjective when I'm gonna say because I just don't dance. I didn't dance Salsa, Bachata... But Zouk, I would say it's also being inside the other person in a way that it's very Contact-ish actually, I think the Zouk is more close to contact.
Harris Hoke 17:44
Cuz with Zouk you have all like this sort of, you know, like this sort of stuff. [wiggles upper body around]
Alexandre Barthélémy 17:49
Tango is two dimensional, like your creativity is two dimensional on the floor and there are Ochos you do on the floor with Zouk, Ochos with your shoulders and your spine three dimensions, so it's crazy. It's amazing but at the same time it's also when you dance close embrace Zouk sometime you can have a connection which is very Contactish and yeah, and very fusional to so so I wouldn't speak so sharp and say Tango is no question like the by far the most fusional dance because they had so many amazing fusional dances with Zouk, but but still there is something superior I could say the Tango of the in this direction of this fusion.
Harris Hoke 18:27
As far as I've experienced and I've done both dances, too... Like, I agree that my experience is very similar to yours. But while there are certain dances you have in Zouk where it's it's a very tight connection, you feel very connected the other person, nothing is quite, I've never felt quite as connected as in Tango, for me.
Alexandre Barthélémy 18:47
Yeah, try Zouk com Calma, in São Paulo and then tell me again. Because in this place, they have some amazing, amazing Zouk dancers, which are more close to Contact, maybe in the way they engage, in the way they dance, and especially with the music and the alternative vibe and the dancers there. I had some pretty fusional dances.
Harris Hoke 19:15
So this is in, so this is in São Paolo?
Alexandre Barthélémy 19:18
Actually to my tastes and to my experience of Contact in the last 10 years. I would say the more the most fusional and intimate and beautiful (maybe to one or two exceptions in Berlin in the Contact Jams) but the most spiritual and amazing Contact dances I had were in São Paulo in Zouk com Calma, more than at Contact. Which is crazy because the Contact feeling you get like I was almost wanting to tell myself Zouk is the new Contact because because what is this experience of fusion and the quality really the quality of the Connection was so high compared to most of the Contact dances I have in Contact jams. That it's an all this energy of this young people this inventing this new dance because Zouk is very fresh and a lot of people are inventing new steps all the time. And they're posted on Instagram. And yeah, I mean, it's still happened in Tango, but not as much. And the Contact is not as fresh as the [Zouk] Contact. There is this freshness and this new energy in the in Zouk right now. And so it depends on the places, but at still, at least I experienced it in São Paulo, and I was like, Wow, is this is this maybe the new way to dance Contact or something like that? But I just wanted to say that this this is taking over in terms of quality, the experience I had in Contact in many occasions, even if I still sometimes encounter amazing, amazing Contact dancers. But you know, it's like, there's lots of energy. There's lots of young dancers, there's so many people and and they have those very energetic parties, and especially in São Paulo,
Harris Hoke 21:06
But you weren't, you weren't necessarily expecting them to see that in São Paulo.
Alexandre Barthélémy 21:09
Yeah, I wasn't expecting that. Because I fell in love with Zouk last summer, or last spring like one year ago, a bit more. So I started to learn it and I understood there or something like that. But I was dancing. I fell in love Zouk by dancing with Saulo Diaz. He made me dance free dance. It was one year, a bit more than one year ago. And I understood that, wow, is I understood he was like a super Maestro. I didn't imagine I would have similar sensation with three different dancer and the same thing with people who are not so famous like him.
Harris Hoke 21:42
Because that's like, that's the center of the Zouk world, Yeah?
Alexandre Barthélémy 21:45
Yeah, Sao Paulo and Rio, they have slightly different style from what I understood. But I didn't go to Rio, I just spent two months and a half in São Paulo.
Harris Hoke 21:53
And I think you get when you have that organicness, and you have that like self assurance, where like... A lot of people in New York are very good Zouk dancers, but there is this idea, "Oh, we go to the class. And we have to learn the technique," as opposed to just being part of that community.
Alexandre Barthélémy 22:07
I think they do both in both cities. But it's true that in São Paulo, you obviously have more more dancers more energy, more people dancing. parties every every, every almost every night or every night and sometimes with two or 300 people.
Harris Hoke 22:23
Oh, that's a different level of scale.
Alexandre Barthélémy 22:25
That's a different level of amount of people. But still, New York is probably the best scene in North America.
Harris Hoke 22:32
I believe that, Yeah, I mean I haven't been extensively. But yeah, I think there's also this thing where like, Zouk is very open minded. Yeah? But it's not... It's not explicitly experimental or deconstructionist. Like they're not. They're not trying to push the boundaries. They're just trying to have a good time. But they're open to like, they're open to experimentation, but it's not framed as experimentation. And I think there are certain benefits of that.
Alexandre Barthélémy 23:01
Yeah, that's interesting. What you're saying this, I need to have I admit, I didn't think about that. And that's an interesting thought, because because you might be right that the idea of "we are experimenting, experimenting," we are too much into wanting to do something like "experimenting.. experimenting..." is maybe, is not the best, I don't know. But there's something interesting in what you just say the fact of, "Oh, we don't have any any claims. We just want to have fun"
Harris Hoke 23:34
It's all like free spirited. Yeah.
Alexandre Barthélémy 23:37
There is a bit less values in a way somehow.
Harris Hoke 23:39
Yeah, there's something that I've been thinking about myself, right. Which is like you have this you have alt-Tango versus traditional Tango. And I think that's wrapped up with... There's this guy from Stanford, I think his name is Richard Powers. He has these three. He says in the ballroom dancing world, the partner dancing world, there are three areas there's social, there is performance.
Alexandre Barthélémy 24:34
Which dance world?
Harris Hoke 24:36
In the ballroom dance world, partner dance world.
So, Performance. Competitive and Social.
Alexandre Barthélémy 24:45
What would be the difference between performance and competitive?
Harris Hoke 24:49
Well, performances and performances like it's aesthetic, right? Like it's, it's for an audience. And competitive is like explicitly, it's also a performance a type of performance you can say, but the goal is not necessarily aesthetic, the goal is to like rank everybody.
Alexandre Barthélémy 25:04
But it's also about aesthetic because the pleasure of the people watching is what is driving the competition.
Harris Hoke 25:10
Yes. And and social, like they're a little bit. It's hard to draw very hard lines. [Especially] in terms of like, who does what. Like, let's say, I went to a Country dance, Country Swing competition. And there were, there were there was a social floor. Right. And there were performances, and there were competitions. And so they're socially constructed in a somewhat artificial way. There was this was this, this one that I went was in Phoenix, Arizona.
Alexandre Barthélémy 25:39
For which Dance?
Harris Hoke 25:40
Country Swing. Which is like a, it's a form of Swing, that's, it's still sort of finding itself musically.
Alexandre Barthélémy 25:46
So the different dancer who, who like different of the three philosophies, they would end up in the different rooms, okay.
Harris Hoke 25:53
And there's a lot of like, it's all the same people who are doing things, right. But in the social dance, and (because you can perform on the social dance floor if someone is looking at you, right if you have an audience), but it's more about that connection you have with your partner.
Alexandre Barthélémy 26:08
There is there is some situation when tango dancers, I have this Tango teacher from Paris, one of the pioneers of Tango in Paris, Natalia Chloe, I liked that she mentioned sometimes Tango is so inside, but it's also a lot on the outside. So you don't dance completely the same. And the way people like look at you dancing and find you beautiful when you dance is not something you can avoid totally and say I'm just dancing. Yeah. Just dancing for myself, that you feel when people watch you dancing, and you dance different. It doesn't mean that you have to perform or to dance different. But it does influence you in a way. Even if you are maybe against it or for it. Whatever your mindset, it can have an effect, it has an effect. And it's also sometimes something specially interesting in the tango. And and yeah, it does look beautiful, more beautiful than Contact, actually. Sometimes, when you want to film Contact, you're like, Oh, it feels so beautiful but it looks...
Harris Hoke 27:13
Even though it's more of an interior thing?
Alexandre Barthélémy 27:15
But for me, as much pleasurable. I had as much fun dancing Contact as I do Tango. But, but it's true that in terms of aesthetic, there is one which is maybe superior to the other I guess. But what you were saying I wanted to say something about what you're saying? Yeah, I was. I'm not particularly interested in competitions. Yeah. But I wanted to say something about that. I forgot anyway.
Harris Hoke 27:43
Well, if you remember, just let me know. I'd love to hear about it.
There's there's this idea. You can't ignore the performance. But I think a lot of people there there. It's like, are you familiar with the outside and versus inside out? concept? And like learning acting? Yeah. Yeah. So I think there's something similar with dance, right? You can look at what someone else is doing with their body. Yeah. And try to mirror it with yours. And try to mirror an aesthetic which is very fraught and can have all sorts of you can try to match things that are not essential. Or you can say like with the Tango, right, you break it down. It's this step. It's this step. It's this step. And now you do it on your body. Yeah, I think that's, that's what I love so much about Contact, is it has the right mindset of, "this is something that is sort of outside and that you make it yours, these are the components and you do it," as opposed to the fact that you're trying to like ape something in terms of the aesthetic.
Alexandre Barthélémy 28:52
Yeah, no, it's definitely something central in the in the learning process. That's you, you have to focus on what is core and the connection and that sometimes if you just focus on the form and the movement is not going to make happening the same inside and is not going to work as it should actually. Watching it is not sufficient. But some time you learn by watching anyway.
Harris Hoke 29:19
Yeah, that's I think that's whenever I go astray on the social dance floor, and I end up doing something that's kind of really muddy or just doesn't work... A lot of the times it's because either I'm totally turned off and I'm not thinking about the appropriate constraints. Like, oh, I can't push this person over the side. I've already pushed them to their limit.
Alexandre Barthélémy 29:36
How do you think we could make more people dance partner dances? Because I feel sometimes frustrated, you know, like, I tried to tell people, I try to tell my flatmates. I try to tell everyone Hey, partner, dancers, are amazing, you should do partner dancers. And we had this conversation with a friend the other day and she told me Yeah, The thing is it doesn't it's not the same when you don't feel it like you get the idea and you understand it when you when you when you try it, just watching it is not enough, like full on.
Harris Hoke 30:13
So many people have this idea in their head, it's part of their identity. Like, "I don't dance." And it's very hard to challenge that.
Alexandre Barthélémy 30:20
I have one of my flatmate here she say, "No, I don't dance. I cannot dance. I can't dance is not for me."
Harris Hoke 30:26
It's threatening, certainly in a lot of different ways to your conception of yourself to your your,
Alexandre Barthélémy 30:30
I don't know how to contradict that. Like, it's difficult. I think I usually I say Tango is not a dance is just about walking. If you know how to walk, you know how to dance.
Harris Hoke 30:39
Well, if we return to the country dancing, yeah. Something that I think can be helpful. Like, I used to sing. I wouldn't sing solo. But I really like performing in a choir. And part of it is because you're with a bunch of people.
Alexandre Barthélémy 30:55
Yeah, so it's more comfortable. Yeah.
Harris Hoke 30:57
And so then a lot of dances like Dominican Bachata is like this. And country dance. A lot of like, getting together as a group and do the steps where you do the line dance. Right? And then you get the rhythm.
Alexandre Barthélémy 31:09
That's actually something that put me away from dance at the beginning, when I was a teenager, because I didn't want to learn 12345 I was a bit rebellious. You know, as a teenager, I was like, I don't want to repeat taking steps 12345 And I don't like I was feeling like, I'm not a militaire or I don't want to do the military. Like you don't teach me how I move. And and it was not so interesting. I was not so interested in dance in general, because I thought partner dancing was just about counting numbers, and receiving orders about where I should move like a robot, you know, yeah. And when I understood Tango was all about improvisation. I was like, oh, it's that dance is something totally different than one thought. And then I fully noticed Tango.
Harris Hoke 31:44
Yes, it's unfortunate. Because I think especially in like the West, broadly construed. And also like, you know, in Russia, especially right? The primary form that most people get exposed to dance is ballet. And ballet is beautiful. Yes. But it's very, it's not a social dance, it's a performance oriented dance. Ant it is very, very particular.
Alexandre Barthélémy 32:08
Some people think maybe dance is just Ballet, and that's an amazing technique for everything. But it's actually a whole word that has nothing to do with Ballet.
Harris Hoke 32:18
I think and Tango and Zouk are really great because they have these like really big organic like social reservoirs. But they're there are definitely dances like West Coast Swing. Sometimes I'll go to teachers and they're great teachers for like a performance WCS. But their whole teaching, the whole philosophy of it and the way they teach is oriented towards that performance framework. It's not towards a social framework. It's not towards an improv framework or something where you're co-creating,
Alexandre Barthélémy 32:53
Or, maybe you can say for example to this, flatmate, I'm thinking about I don't dance, I don't know how to dance. I don't know how to move my body. I'm not interested. I suppose one could say, but you know how to cuddle someone you know how to cuddle the baby, you know, how to, you know how to interact beautifully with even sex, for example, yeah, with someone. And so so in a way you know how to use it and you have pleasure from, from this kind of activity of cuddling. So this is Contact or this is something that relates to partner dance, even if it's tricky to say that because you don't want to go into the idea that partner dance is about sexuality.
Harris Hoke 33:34
But even, when you said that, I think that's true of a lot of people. But I think a lot of people, even when they're in the sexual act, there, there's a part of them that's very self conscious or ashamed, that has to put on some TV or put on some music or something not as like, an adjunct or like to set the scene but to like, sort of distract, or to, you know, to turn down the lights or whatever it is, right. I think a lot of people have a great deal of self consciousness with those things. And I think you're right that like, at some level, they know how to do it.
Alexandre Barthélémy 34:12
The simple idea about putting music like I'm going to put music to have sex, or I'm not going to put on music to have sex is like a decision or is going to make more entertaining, or you're insecure. So I'm going to put music in somebody new. But but the thing is, I forgot what I wanted to say Did you know that actually Contact Improv, one of the origin of the idea of Contact Improv, Steve Paxton (and I don't know exactly the detail of this). But one of the key idea that, "oh, we should start Contact," it was the inspiration of some research of some doctor who was filming Mothers and the baby and how they move together. Have you heard about that?
Harris Hoke 34:53
No.
Alexandre Barthélémy 34:53
So at the origin of contact there were these research about doctors that filmed in slow motion. Looked at the babies and their mother and see how they were moving. Oh no, it was in the 50s. It was just filming. And they were filming mother and their baby moving together. And they were trying to observe the movement and how the mother was behaving with their babies. And, and apparently, several people, several sources say to me, I don't know the precise precise story. I think I would like to Google it. But there is something at the origin of contact that comes from actually Mother and baby cuddling together and the origin of Contact Improvisation dance, which is crazy.
Harris Hoke 35:35
That's fascinating. it's very interesting.
Alexandre Barthélémy 35:38
You can Google it. It's I'm sure it's somewhere.
Harris Hoke 35:41
Well, it's 7:34. I don't want to take up too much time though I'm sure we could keep talking
Alexandre Barthélémy 35:52
Thank you very much.
