Foto:Efrat Mazor

CLASS

# GAGA Online

Gaga is the movement language developed by Ohad Naharin throughout many years, parallel to his work as a choreographer and the artistic director of Batsheva Dance Company. Gaga originated from Naharin’s need to communicate with his dancers and his curiosity in the ongoing research of movement. Gaga classes are predicated on a deep listening to the body and to physical sensations. The instructions are deployed to increase awareness of and further amplify sensation, and rather than turning from one prompt to another, information is layered, building into a multisensory, physically challenging experience. While many instructions are imbued with rich imagery, the research of Gaga is fundamentally physical, insisting on a specific process of embodiment. Inside this shared research, the improvisational nature of the exploration enables each participant’s deeply personal connection with Gaga. Gaga provides a framework for discovering and strengthening the body and adding flexibility, stamina, agility, and skills including coordination and efficiency while stimulating the senses and imagination. The classes offer a workout that investigates form, speed, and effort while traversing additional spectrums such as those between soft and thick textures, delicacy and explosive power, and understatement and exaggeration. Participants awaken numb areas, increase their awareness of habits, and improve their efficiency of movement inside multilayered tasks, and they are encouraged to connect to pleasure inside moments of effort. The language of Gaga is in a continual process of evolution, and the classes vary and develop accordingly.

Gaga/dancers classes are open to professional dancers or advanced dance students ages 16+. These classes last for an hour and fifteen minutes and are taught by dancers who have worked closely with Ohad Naharin. Gaga/dancers classes are built on the same principles as Gaga/people classes but also employ the specific vocabulary and skills that are part and parcel of a dancer’s knowledge. The layering of familiar movements with Gaga tasks presents dancers with fresh challenges, and throughout the class, teachers prompt the dancers to visit more unfamiliar places and ways of moving as well. Gaga/dancers deepens dancers’ awareness of physical sensations, expands their palette of available movement options, enhances their ability to modulate their energy and engagheir explosive power, and enriches their movement quality with a wide range of textures.

ABOUT

Smadar Goshen is an Israeli free-lance choreographer, dancer and a movement educator, based in Stuttgart, Germany.

She graduated with a B.A and a Master’s degree in Choreography and Dance from the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance.

Smadar has been choreographing and performing professionally since 2011 in different festivals, competitions and platforms around the world.

In addition, Smadar is a certified GYROTONIC® & GYROKINESIS® pre-trainer (teacher’s trainer) and teacher since 2009. Alongside her path as a dancer, she also specialized in body rehabilitation and movement articulation guidance.

She became a certified Gaga teacher in 2019, participating the Gaga Teacher’s Training Program in Suzanne Dellal, Tel Aviv, where she was trained under Ohad naharin, Bosmat Nossan and Saar Harari.