WCCIF 2007 Media Release

ATTENTION CALENDAR, DANCE, AND ENTERTAINMENT EDITORS

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: February 16, 2007

PRESS CONTACT: Karen Campbell 415.264.3024 contact@wccif.com

THE 19TH ANNUAL WEST COAST CONTACT IMPROVISATION FESTIVAL
IN BERKELEY'S 8TH STREET STUDIOS, JUNE 29-JULY 4, 2007

(Berkeley, CA) The 19th annual West Coast Contact Improvisation Festival (WCCIF) will be held at 8th Street Studios in Berkeley, CA, from June 29 to July 4. This year we have a theme - Deepening the Experience - that will enliven and inform all of the classes, labs, discussions, performances and jams. We offer interconnected classes within three tracks - Performance, Somatics and Community - that will allow participants to explore specific aspects of contact improvisation in depth. Classes are available for professional dancers and people new to Contact Improvisation interested in learning in a safe and respectful community.

Each day offers many opportunities led by 31 wonderful West Coast contact improvisation teachers– 3 two-hour sessions in the morning and afternoon - 5 classes and skill-labs during each session - plus lunch-time discussions - and two studios dedicated for contact jams every night of the festival. Participate in the whole festival, or come for the evening performances and contact jams.

Intensives include a 5-day Beginners Intensive: an Advanced Intensive; a 3-day All-Levels Somatics Intensive; and a Somatics (Psychotherapy & CI) Intensive. More two-class mini-intensives geared toward deepening participants skills in performance, improvisation and cultivating mind-body connection.

Evening highlights include three nights of performance – two nights of informal student/teacher performances and a curated faculty performance. Students are highly encouraged to perform work-in-progress and exchange feedback. Rehearsal space and time is available and included within tuition.

Our 5th annual Jam Day event, Monday July 2, with five studios dedicated to jamming, includes an all-festival community gathering, special facilitated scores, One-on-One private sessions with festival teachers, plus time for beginners to dance with experienced contact improvisors!

Contact Improvisation (CI) is a dance technique, first developed in the 1970s, in which points of physical contact provide the starting point for movement improvisation and exploration. Practitioners spontaneously create movement material using the human body as it already exists.
Contact Improvisation can be practiced as a concert or social dance form. CI's fluid, weight-sharing and aerial partnering style is one of the best-known and most characteristic forms of postmodern dance. In the social setting, Contact Improvisation meetings are called jams where dancers both observe and participate, using the time to explore the limits of the form.

Contact Improvisation is a grass-roots, community-based art form that has rooted itself in hundreds of communities across the globe; from Europe to Australia and South America to Japan. The West Coast Contact Improvisation Festival is a unique 5-day social event presented annually by a collective of 60+ Contact Improvisation teachers who are dedicated to practicing and sharing this unique form of improvisational dance/movement.

Come join us June 29th to July 4th for the West Coast Contact Improvisation Festival!

Please see our website at www.wccif.com for course descriptions, full schedule of events, and registration information. Scholarship and Work Exchange opportunities are available. Public contact: contact@wccif.com