Mirva Mäkinen

Horizontal falling

Contact improvisation is based on the communication between two moving bodies that are in physical contact and their combined relationship to the physical laws that govern their movement; gravity, momentum, inertia. The body, in order to feel these sensations, learns to release excess muscular tension and abandon a certain quality of willfulness to experience the natural flow of movement. This workshop will include rolling, falling, being upside down, following a physical point of contact, supporting and giving weight to a partner. We will aim towards movable support and gentle flying technique. This could be also called horizontal falling.

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Mirva Mäkinen graduated as a Doctor of Dance from University of Arts in Helsinki in 2018. Her doctoral research is about Somaesthetics of Contact Improvisation. She graduated (MA) from the Dance Department from the University of Arts, Finland in 2000, before that she did masters of Physical Education from University of Jyväskylä.

She is a dance teacher, choreographer and lecturer for dance at the Kallio Upper Secondary School of Performing Arts (permanent position 2000 ->). She has been teaching in several dance companies, Universities and international dance and contact improvisation festivals. Mirva has been working as a dancer with many different dance companies and choreographers, here few of them: Dancecompany Karttunen Kollektiv (choreographer Jyrki Karttunen), New Circus Company Circo Aereo, choreographer Joona Halonen, Echo Echo dance company (Ireland), collaboration with Frey Faust and collaboration with JoergHassmann. Last ten years she has been  working with finnish choreographer Valtteri Raekallio.

In dance I am interested in the feeling of flow and soft movement. I love to investigate movement, its rhythm and different ways of inhabiting the body. A feeling of dancing is created by being able to switch the body from total relaxation to extreme intensity and tension. I call this the body’s ability to breathe and create movement.
phd: https://actascenica.teak.fi/makinen-mirva
website: www.mirvamakinen.com