CONTACT @ the DOJO
Contact Improvisation (CI) class & jam
Mixed level, open to beginners and advanced
Gabrielle Revlock and Kristin EttingerAikido Dojo, Florence MA 2024
2025
1st & 3rd Sundays
Oct 19 Gabrielle Revlock
11/2 Patrick Crowley
11/16 Frieda Kipar Bay
12/7 Patrick Crowley
12/21 Lilianna Kane
3:00–6:00 pm
3:00 Class, 4:30 Jam
Oct 19, 2025 Lateral Activation w/ Gabrielle Revlock
In Contact Improvisation, we often refer to the backspace—a counterbalance to the habitual forward orientation of daily life. In this class, we’ll turn our attention to lateral activation. By cultivating responsiveness in the side body, we’ll discover new pathways for connection, balance, and thrilling no-handed lifts.
Gabrielle Revlock is an NYC-based internationally touring postmodern choreographer with over twenty years of experience in Contact Improvisation. She is a recipient of a New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” Award and holds an MFA in Choreography & Performance from Smith College. Recent teaching engagements included Brinca Galicia Contact Festival (Spain), European Contact Improvisation Teachers Exchange (Poland), West Coast Contact Improvisation Jam (Berkeley), and the Ontario Regional Contact Improv Dance Jam (Toronto). As the creator of Restorative Contact, a mindful touch practice, she has been an invited speaker at the Embodiment Conference, Dance & Somatics Conference and Future of CI conference. "Therapeutic Applications of Contact Improvisation," an essay co-authored with Aaron Brandes, is published in Resistance and Support: Contact Improvisation at 50 edited by Ann Cooper Albright. More at GabrielleRevlock.com
CONTACT @ THE DOJO
Once a month, Patrick Crowley teaches the contact improvisation class, and once a month, he curates other teachers, who hold and convey Contact Improvisation with a comprehensive depth. Contact @ the Dojo began in Oct 2021, meeting twice a month on Sundays.
Dojo comes from “Do-”, a variation of Tao/Dao (the way) and “jo” (immersive learning space).
3-4:30 pm CLASS (general description)
A broad range of Contact Improvisation will be explored — states, skills, scores/Underscore, artistic practice, life learnings.
In Contact @ the Dojo, dancers play with movement pathways in contact with a partner — in relationship with weight, gravity, momentum, inertia, and friction. We work with ease and natural tone in our tissues and neurology. We explore rolling, falling, and flying in CI with the safety of the mats as our floor.
The slow and subtle brings us to the big and enthusiastic, and vice versa. Center, perception, integrated body, solo/follow/lead/3rd entity, reflexes, experimentation, readiness, rigor, heart, awareness, and enlivening will all be in the mix.
Please arrive a little early. Most people who come for class stay for the jam.
January Workshop 2012 © Emily Bowman4:30-6 pm JAM
The jam will be open space to play and practice — with some music and possible structure/warm-up.
For those experienced and new to CI, honoring different abilities. ~10–25 people. BIPOC & LGBTQIA+ welcoming. Please come w/ no symptoms: Health safety agreements.
What is Contact Improvisation?
WHERE: Aikido of Northampton
30 N Maple St, #14, Florence, MA 01062
(Park in parking lot to right of building. Come in entrance in parking lot. Go in and upstairs to right.)
Dojo Etiquette:
- Take shoes off outside the door
- Bow to space when entering & exiting.
- Hygiene & what to wear: Bathe that day. Clean feet, cut & filed toenails. Wash or sanitize hands upon entering. Wear pants that are free to move in — no belts. Little/no jewelry, no belt buckles.
Other Info:
- Please come early (5-15 min) to leave enough time (for finding the Dojo, parking, settling in the space, and making payment if you haven’t).
- The Dojo is in the center of Florence: 30 N Maple St, #14, Florence, MA 01062. Upstairs.
- Health safety: come with no symptoms; no exposure to someone with illness in the last 3 days. Health safety agreements
- Here is my approach to CI.
- Be ready. The class can be quite physical and there is a lot input in a number of ways. You may not be able to do everything so you can always modify and/or witness/take breaks.
- Bathrooms are downstairs to right.
Aikido of Northampton Dojo © Emily Bowman