This paper analyzes the performance of “Connected” by focusing on the proprioceptive senses. Presented at Ewha Woman’s University Performance Hall 1, “Connected” was performed based on ballet movements and characteristics of post-modern dance and somatics. This research adopted a practice-based research methodology and followed five steps: research design → concept formation → composition and practice → performance and analysis → examination of the research findings. The researcher videotaped practice sessions and kept a journal of proceedings during the study. In order to analyze the dance work thoroughly, the researcher explored the role that an audience’s visual sense plays in a ballet performance as well as the performer’s senses in post-modern dance. The researcher looked inward with the concept of proprioceptive senses in somatics in order to analyze the researcher’s own ballet performance. The findings based on “Connected” can be summarized as follows. First, after stimulating senses in the first part of the practice, the researcher had a more delicate understanding of the soma. As the researcher gained more knowledge about one’s soma, including contraction and relaxation levels and range of motion, the researcher felt more comfortable, focusing more on expressing oneself. Second, the routine and habitual movements felt different because the researcher was dancing according to one’s feelings. The researcher was able to focus more on the performance’s qualitative aspects, indulging in dancing and performing more sensuously, rather than focusing on the quantitative factors, the mere connecting of different moves. Finally, the researcher was able to dance with more freedom when trying to stimulate the proprioceptive senses while remaining conscious of the audience. Rather than practicing and performing routinely and putting too much emphasis on the audience’s perceptions, the researcher moved with more freedom. This research demonstrates that stimulating the proprioceptive senses of the researcher was essential to the dancing. Through proprioceptive sense stimulation, dancers may produce more comfortable and seamless moves, which may also result in a higher quality performance. In this regards, this research suggests that performers can enhance the quality of their performances when they thoroughly understand their own soma through proprioceptive sense stimulation.

This dissertation investigates the way dancers experience the “personality of soma” while practicing. The purpose of this dissertation was to study the interrelationship between the personality of soma and the creation of unique dances. This study included dancers learning original movements and the entire process of practicing. The author used practice-based research and other academic resources for the study. First, major terms, such as “soma,” “somatic learning,” and “personality of soma” were defined based on other academic sources. The discussion of the concepts of soma and somatic learning is primarily based on the somatics of Thomas Hanna. The personality of soma discussion is based mainly on the concepts that Karol Wojtyla suggested from a theological perspective: origin solitude, origin nakedness, and origin unity. Practice-based research informed analysis of the entire process of constructing the piece, creating choreography, practicing, and performing. Somatic data was derived from the researcher’s first-person observation, and dancers were employed as the subjects of analysis. Experiencing the personality of soma consists of four stages: recognition, awareness, unity, and openness to soma. First, the experience of silence caused the dancers to recognize their soma and discover the potential within them. Second, the experience of origin solitude allowed the dancers to discover creativity and autonomy within their soma through an exploration of autonomous movement. Third, the experience of origin unity provided a chance to realize that soma has its own way of conducting communication and personal interaction. Fourth, undergoing the origin nakedness stage, the dancers learned how to dance their unique moves without the eyes of others, a perspective that they had internalized. The researcher who participated in the study gained self-esteem and recovered the personality of soma. They also created unique dance through a development of their own dance moves. By conducting this study, the researcher experienced transitions from passive, memorization-based learning to active learning, which allowed the utilization of somatic sensations.

Based on the practice PBR (Practice Based Research), this study investigates the entire process from the planning of Frame in Gymnasium Hall I of Ewha Womans University on Jun. 7, 2019 to its performance. It means textualizing and historicizing a performance work overcoming the ephemerality and temporality of the dance

Referencing the concept of the analysis method presented in “Frame Analysis” (1974) of a famous American scholar Erving Goffman(1922~1982), Frame consists of three sub-themes, “assumptions,” “experience composition and frame,” and “basic keys.” The choreographic purpose of Frame is to deliver a message to form the choreographer’s own frame independently and actively, rather than to passively adapt within the confrontation of frame.

The results of this study on the creation, choreographing process and practice to its performance are as follows. First, Frame’s intention and subject of choreography was effectively revealed through the visual and auditory elements. Second, I could be found from immersion in movements through my inner workings and breathing. Lingering imagery of breathing and feelings could be felt during the practice and performance. Third, expression of the researcher’s life direction in Frame helped building the choreographer’s artistic world. This paper will provide an opportunity for the researcher to gain researcher’s capability of research and grow as an artist in dance creation field.