Beaudesert High dance students have gained inspiration from experienced dancers and choreographers.
Year 9 and 11 students were recently treated to workshops with contemporary dance group, Phluxus2 Dance Collective.
Beaudesert High dance teacher and Acting Head of the Arts Gemma Wuersching said the workshops were highly beneficial to the students.
“The Year 9 dance students were in the middle of their contemporary choreographic assessment, and the purpose of their workshop was to give them some industry tools to choreograph from,” she said.
“Jacob Watton is a young up and coming choreographer in Queensland, and he has that ability to give them tools that he uses to create professional works for dance companies and dancers.
“They really get some professional help, so they’re creating choreography themselves, using tools the industry professionals are working on, changing processes, getting real time experience.”
The students were creating a contemporary choreographic work based on the stimulus of “journey” at the time of the workshops, with plans to use tools learned at the workshop to create a two-to-three-minute piece in groups.
Year 11 students were learning about movement at the time of their workshop.
“To do that they need to look through the lens of multiple world-renowned choreographers. So, Jill Wang came in – she is an international dancer, she’s worked with a lot of American companies,” Ms Wuersching said.
“She gave them that real industry experience of learning a technique from someone who’s learned it from the company. She took them through warm up and fitness, warm up and cool down depending on what their task was.
“It was about really letting loose and getting the body just to move organically.”
Ms Wuersching said students learned a lot from the workshops.
“They’re definitely inspired to look at things from a different perspective,” she said.
“We do it at kind of the startup before they get into a unit or an assessment, so it really engages them instantly and they’ve got those constant reference points as they develop their learning.
“They’re constantly referring back to the workshop, then it makes sense. It’s a continual connection there.”
