Dance of the Senses: the Constant Movement of Change / Elisa Lind Finnbogadottir (2024)

This thesis provides an account of the process and reflection on an ongoing personal enquiry into the felt sense of the body through the practice of dancing. This research is both an unfolding of the development of my creative practice and an exploration on how that practice can be shared. This choice of research arises from my inherent nature to care for the health of the life that surrounds me, and my personal journey of including my life in that care. This research is grounded in and nurtured through open ended questions into the felt experience of my body and this document traces how my approach to listening to the felt sense changes as I explore what arises to my awareness. Attempting to articulate the experience of the felt sense through movement expression, visual representation and writing, this research is a life-long practice of learning through a growing awareness of the felt sense. Approaching the felt sense of the body as the human presentation of the universal energy, I draw inspiration and language from the science of quantum theory and by relating to the spiritual discoveries of two pioneers in modern dance, Isadora Duncan and Rudolf Laban. This thesis acknowledges dancing as a spiritual practice, as well as certifying the widely known healing aspects of dancing (Halprin, 2000), this paper questions the potentiality of these qualities in dance as performance. It is an exploration of my personal relationship with dancing; how dancing contributes to my ability to embrace life’s challenges and how those teachings can be shared and further experienced with other bodies. This written reflection narrates a non-linear, personal exploration of the potentials within human consciousness, with the core themes of ‘connectedness’ and ‘separateness’ experienced simultaneously as a desired state of being.