Falling into Weighted Time
Entwining Dance & Health
Falling into Weighted Time
(in development)
Experience a moment of Collapsing while Conscious where boundaries between wakefulness and dreams blur. A delicate shift between strength and surrender. A world of Cataplexy (a symptom of Type 1 Narcolepsy) when time slows down, gravity intensifies and boundaries of perception expand.
‘Falling into Weighted Time’ tells an intimate story of how one dancer found a silver lining in the face of a failing body. When medicine no longer had answers she turned to the support of a dance bungee. Entwining a foundation in Middle Eastern dance with audio description, autobiographical narrative and audience interaction, she presents dance as power and purpose. Leaving an appreciation of the body’s knowledge and that cultivating deeper connections with our physical selves enhances all qualities of life.
About the New Work
A solo Contemporary Middle Eastern dance by Dr Laura (Amara) Osweiler.
The work is an opportunity for Laura as an artist with disability working in a CaLD dance to share her story of Collapsing while Conscious. Stemming from living with Narcolepsy Type 1 (a neurological sleep disorder) and one of its symptoms, Cataplexy (when the body goes into REM stage while my mind is awake) and Hypo-arousal, a symptom of C-PTSD (when the body shuts down).
Laura focuses on the importance of body knowledge and ways to use dance and creativity to manage chronic illnesses. She uses her body’s experiences of these episodes to create choreography and dance and then applies that material into her Middle Eastern dance foundation and creative practice.
This work brings up themes of Crip Time and Crip Energy (terms to indicate when someone faces barriers due to not living/working in society’s typical sense of time), interruption and disruption, types of memory, forms of consciousness and perceptions of the self.
She interweaves dance, grounded aerial dance bungee, lighting, music, audio description, autobiographical narrative and audience interaction to tell her story and bring people deeper into the work.
Audience Sharing Comments
Learn more!
Eastside Radio Interview (2023), Dance Informa Interview (2022) and her Intro to Critical Path’s E-News Oct 2022.
Creative Team
Laura Osweiler | Dancer, Choreographer, Script
Paul Osborne | Lighting Designer
Imogen Yang | Audio Description & Script Consultant
Sarah Houbolt | Audio Description Consultant
AusDance NSW DAIR | Creative Development
During this creative development Dr Laura Osweiler worked with Imogen Yang (audio description consultant). They explored how AD and information about Middle Eastern dance, Laura’s personal dance practice and Narcolepsy can be developed into a script. Laura also worked with Paul Osborne about the structure, script and lighting design.
In the sharing, Laura presented several choreographic practices that she is using to develop the new work and tested audience activities found in the dance and for future workshops and group development projects.
This project is supported by Ausdance NSW’s DAIR program and the NSW Government through Create NSW.
Video | Sharing | 23 June 2023
Closed captioned. Time code below video.
Time Code
3.45: Introduction to work done with collaborators: Imogen Yang &Â Paul Osborne
5.00: Introduction to sharing
6,00: Exercise 1 | Knee Shimmy & Cataplexic Knee Collapses
19.15: Exercise 2 | Internal Exploration of Health
25.00: Exercise 3 | ‘Nirvana’ State
35:00 Wrap up
March Dance 2023 | Creative Development
During her 2023 March Dance Residency, Laura expanded on the theme of Collapsing while Conscious to include hypo-arousal a symptom of C-PTSD (when the body shuts down after a hyper-arousal state (fight or flight)).
She continued developing the dance’s structure, a script which threads together audio description, verbal description and autobiographical information, audience engagement and lighting design with Paul Osborne.
Video | 2nd Half of Sharing | 16 March 2023
Laura explored narrating the script before each movement section.
Closed captioned. Time code below video.
Time Code
16.25: Narrative | Collapsing while conscious degrees
18.30: Nirvana | Audience Engagement
23.00: Narrative | Arms
25.20: Dance | Arms
Critical Path 2022 | Research Residency
Laura explored movements that supported her management of episodes, the dance bungee as an apparatus of support, phases within episodes as inspiration for the dance’s structure, music and lighting as ephemeral voices that embrace the movements’ meaning, how to integrate audio description, personal descriptions and autobiographical material into a text and audiences activities.
Video | Sharing | 31 Aug 2022
This sharing was an opportunity for Laura to test and present many ideas and concepts from her research. The video captured the very early stages of a work in process.
Closed captioned. Time code below video.
Time Code
00: Acknowledgement of Country
1.25: Audio description of space & Laura
2.00: Thank you to Critical Path Team & collaborators (Paul Osborne, Sarah Houbolt & Tobii Bucknell
3.00: Intro to sharing
3.50: Intro to visual description exercise
4.30: Internal visual description exercise with audience
9.20: External visual description exercise with audience
15.20: Awake Dance | Upbeat & Energised
17.00: Awake Dance | Strength
18.30: Cataplectic Knee Release & Middle Eastern Dance Knee Shimmies Connection
20.30: Audience Chooses my Adventure | Should I show how I fight or accept catapeltic episodes? They choose fight.
21.10: Ankle Harness Walk | My List of Triggers
23.30: Ankles in Dance Bungee Harness | Facts About Narcolepsy
32.50: Story About Walking in Public with a Mild Catapeltic Episode
35.20: Harness & the Box | If the World Took Siestas
37.45: Harness| Slow Weighted
30.30: Harness | Twinkle Toes
41.20: Harness | Large Circles
43.50: Harness | Small and Low
45.15: Harness | Held & Slides
48.30: Nirvana Moment in Deep Catapeltic Episode
56.50: Arms in Harness | Swing & Slide
58.50: Arms in Harness | Accents and Releases
1.01: Discussion with Audiences
Social Media Posts
Support
Creative Development Residency
Create NSW for DAIR 2023 Program
Ausdance NSW 2023 DAIR Program @ACPE
Accessible Arts’ 2023 Next Level Program @Sydney Dance Company
Dance March Festival 2023, Critical Path, City of Sydney
Accessible Arts’ 2023 Front and Centre Program
Research Residency
Critical Path 2022