Somatic Arts Concert

BOULDER, Colo. (January 3, 2012)—Naropa University’s Somatic Counseling Psychology Program presents the 16th Annual Somatic Arts Scholarship Concert: “These Bodying Waters.” The concert bridges the creative process of art making and performance with the psychotherapeutic disciplines of Body Psychotherapy and Dance/Movement Therapy to create an experience that is at once entertaining and therapeutic. Donations generated from the concert fund scholarships for two Somatic Counseling students who illustrate financial need as well as excellence in academics and community-based service.

Performances have been scheduled for Friday, January 27, and Saturday, January 28, 2012, in Naropa University’s Performing Arts Center located at 2130 Arapahoe Avenue, Boulder, CO. Both performances begin at 8 p.m. and there is a $12 suggested donation. For more information, call 303-245-4753 or email or hvictoria@naropa.edu.

The concert will showcase sixteen performances choreographed and performed by students, faculty and staff of the Naropa University Somatic Counseling Psychology Program.

All of the pieces in this dynamic dance-based concert are examples of embodied performance. What makes embodied performance unique is the empathy it creates between the performer and their audience. To embody means to give physical presence, form and tangibility to a feeling, idea or quality. This empathy changes the way the performance is received. Viewing honest expression through the frame of art inspires the audience to relate to universal human experience, fostering a sense of understanding and belonging.

Directed by Somatic Counseling Psychology students Abigail Lubahn and Ellen Philpott, the concert allows participants to translate the skills they are learning into creative work, as well as raise scholarship monies for the program. “Dance/Movement Therapy has roots in the modern dance movement and has always held, as one of its tenets, that the creative process is fundamentally healing and transformative,” says Leah D’Abate, co-faculty advisor of the Somatic Arts Scholarship Concert. “In order to support that tenet, we devised this opportunity to give those involved a chance to come into intimate relationship with the creative process.”

In September 2011, choreographers and performers began crafting work together with the structure and support of the theme of water. The 16th Annual Somatic Arts Scholarship Concert, “These Bodying Waters,” brings us into relationship with the human body as it echoes the earth’s body, both composed of 75% water. The pieces in the concert reflect this fluidity and draw inspiration from the movement and metaphor of water in many forms: wild, still, nourishing, cleansing, strengthening, bounded, playful. As performers are informed by their psychotherapeutic training and the professional mandate to ripple service into global communities, “These Bodying Waters” reflect not only the personal need for the embodiment of water, but an offering to quench a creative and mutual communal thirst.

In addition to the performance and back by popular demand, the Performing Arts Center lobby will showcase a Visual Art Silent Auction that also reflects the theme of “These Bodying Waters.” Audience members will have a chance to bid on student-crafted visual art, wind chimes, yoga lessons, and more. Proceeds will benefit the Somatic Counseling Psychology scholarship fund.

History
The Somatic Arts Scholarship Concert is an annual student directed event sponsored by the Somatic Counseling Psychology Program. The concert was originally conceived of in 1996 by Paola Faggella, a Dance/Movement Therapy student invested in exploring the interface of art making and therapeutic training. The concert brings students, family, faculty and the Boulder community together to witness the creative and healing powers of embodied performance.

Naropa University was one of the first institutions in the nation to offer a degree in somatic counseling psychology. The twenty-two-year-old Master of Arts program is based on the belief that a functional unity exists between the mind and body and that therapeutic change occurs through direct experience of the present moment.

Within the Somatic Counseling Psychology Program, there are two areas of concentration: Body Psychotherapy and Dance/Movement Therapy. Both areas offer extensive psychotherapy study, training and supervision grounded in the integration of body, mind and movement.

Accredited by the Higher Learning Commission and a member of the North Central Association, Naropa University is a private, nonprofit, nonsectarian liberal arts institution dedicated to advancing contemplative education. This approach to learning integrates the best of Eastern and Western educational traditions, helping students know themselves more deeply and engage constructively with others. The university comprises a four-year undergraduate college and graduate programs in the arts, education, environmental leadership, psychology and religious studies.

Naropa University is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission and a member of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. Naropa University is a private, nonprofit, nonsectarian liberal arts institution dedicated to advancing contemplative education. This approach to learning integrates the best of Eastern and Western educational traditions, helping students know themselves more deeply and engage constructively with others. The University comprises a four-year undergraduate college and graduate programs in the arts, education, environmental leadership, psychology, and religious studies.