THE WORKSHOP IS CANCELLED due to corona restrictions. This course, instructed by Elina Hauta-aho, tunes the participants to delicate observation of their own body: its rhythms, wisdom, depth, inner connections and relationship to the space and other human beings around it. We enjoy being here and now together as living entities with the ability to dance.

Course activities include different improvisatory and somatic tasks performed solo, in pairs and in groups. Writing and looking at others are also used as concentration aids. The activities are based on Hauta-aho’s long experience and work with improvisation and individual motion.

Elina Hauta-aho is a Helsinki-based dance artist and a mother of two young human beings. She works extensively in the field of dance as a performer, instigator of workgroups for her production concepts, instructor, producer, etc. She is currently working on a production called And Life, the first instalment of a two-part performance (Maunulatalo 2021). She is also a founding member of several active groups, such as Go Go Dance Group Hot Tubes, Vivarium Collective and TRIOT. Elina Hauta-aho has worked as a performer in choreographies by Jouni Järvenpää, Iina Taijonlahti, Ervi Sirén, Jenni Kivelä, Maija Mustonen, Hanna Pajala-Assefa and Beniamino Borghi. She also worked as the director of the dance program in Central Ostrobothnia Vocational College from 2014 to 2016, and has graduated as a Master of Art (Dance) from the Theatre Academy in 2008. 

For her, creating and experiencing art is a place for deconstructing, revealing and rebuilding the meanings of our human activities and patterns of thinking. What she finds especially valuable in dance is the always new potential to encounter the unknown that can gradually open from fleeting sensations towards an understanding of wider connections.