ResDance Series 10: Episode 9: Moving Beyond the Studio: Improvisation, Storytelling and the Practice of Being Human with Helen Kindred

ResDance Series 10: Episode 9: Moving Beyond the Studio: Improvisation, Storytelling and the Practice of Being Human with Helen Kindred In this episode, Helen shares insights from her experiences across a range of dance practices, with a particular focus onimprovisation as both a performance practice and a life skill. Drawing on the ways her artistic and teaching practices are informed by Bartenieff Fundamentals, Helen reflects on how movement has been a source of both physical and emotional safety throughout her life. She speaks about the value of slowing down, doing less, and creating space for imagination, play, and discovery. We also discuss how her approach to movement fosters a more sensory relationship with the body—one rooted in awareness, connection, and the wider role movement plays in everyday life. Throughout the conversation, Helen reflects on how movement can deepen our relationship with ourselves and others. Biography Helen is a dance-artist and scholar whose work over the past 30yrs has moved in layers of, community engagement, choreographic practice-as-research, and pedagogies of dance, and somatic practices. Helen’s teaching philosophy centres on relational and inclusive ways of being in theworld. Helen’s research practice builds on her long-standing practice of Bartenieff Fundamentals; using LBMS as a framework for engaging with people and places, nurturing environments of imaginative explorations and play throughimprovisation. Publications include ‘In-the-Between-ness: Decolonising and re-inhabiting our dancing’, co-authored chapter with Dr Adesola Akinleye in Narratives in Black British Dance Embodied Perspectives (Akinleye, A. (ed. 2018), ‘Improvisation and Change’ article in Animated (Summer2020), ‘Moving Meditations: embodying Bartenieff Fundamentals through sensorial awareness of breath, bones, and gravity’, Journal of Dance, Movement andSpiritualities (2022). The ‘Female’ Dancer: a soma-scientific approach (Eds with Claire Farmer, 2024), Dancing Place: scores of the city, scores of the shore, co-authored with Dr Adesola Akinleye (2026). Helen is Director ofStudies at Northern School of Contemporary Dance https://www.nscd.ac.uk, co-Artistic Director of DancingStrong Movement Lab https://dancingstrongmovementlab.com and a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Dance, Movement and Spiritualities https://www.intellectbooks.com/dance-movement-spiritualities. Contact details/Social media channels Email: [email protected] Social Media: Facebook: HelenKindred / Instagram: @helenkindred Other social media handles @northern_school @dancingstrong_movementlab Other links of relevance https://dancingstrongmovementlab.com, https://www.nscd.ac.uk   https://www.intellectbooks.com/dancing-place  https://www.routledge.com/The-Female-Dancer-a-soma-scientific-approach/Farmer-Kindred/p/book/9781032466897 Please share this episode with students, educators, practitioners, performers, and interdisciplinary researchers curious to learn more about dance research in action.