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ABOUT US – ECKI

ECKHARD MÜLLER

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born 1962 in a little village s/w of, Germany, living in Freiburg and Strasbourg

I’ve met Contact Improvisation in 1988, which was like a “magnesium experience” for me. This made me want to study contemporary dance (release technique, alignment, improvisation, contact improvisation, instant composition, composition) at bewegungs-art Freiburg, (diploma in ‘93). I’ve continued learning from Alito Alessi, David Zambrano, Mark Tompkins, Julyen Hamilton, Martin Keogh and Nancy Stark-Smith among many others and I am continuously learning from other teachers, my dance partners, our co-teaching and my own research.

Dancing CI became my first love, right away. Besides this I’ve also had a strong focus on performance in the 90’ and early 2000. I was researching and performing with other improvisers in diverse collectives to develop my own understanding of “Instant Composition”. Some of them are: the collective around Hanna Barbara, Basel in the early 90ies, the improvisation company “movingart” in Freiburg and Nunatac Impro-company US/GER in the mid 90ies … and Langues des Boefs actually.
As a dancer I was working for choreographies of Iztok Kovac (‘94), Mark Tompkins (‘94-‘96), David Zambrano (‘97/98), Angelika Ächter (96-2000) beside others and created 2 solo pieces (‘95 and 2000). The last one “Brador Far” performed in several European cities: Freiburg, Berlin, Potsdam, Bern, Basel and Budapest,

Since 2002 I am part of the Dance Theatre Company Dégadézo in Strasbourg France, have been involved in 3 productions and some structured improvisations. The company teaches Improvisation and CI in diverse institutions, organizes a regular Jam and is supported by DRAC Region Alsace, co-produced by Pole Sud Theater and TJP.

I started to teach Contact Improvisation in 1994 regionally and from 2000 also worldwide. Since then, teaching CI became my main focus. From 2004 onwards I was touring Europe and the Americas (North and South), co-teaching with Daniela Schwartz in diverse universities, dance institutes, festivals and studios.

Together with Bernd KA and Renate Wehner, I’m also offering an annual CI training program in Freiburg Germany, since 2000, in collaboration with bewegungs-art Freiburg and the TIP school.

In 2013, the Monday Momentum collective was created out of a group of CI teachers from Freiburg Germany, wishing to share their teaching as well as continuing their research and exchange.

Since the beginning I’ve also put a lot of energy in building up and supporting “contact communities” in my own home city of Freiburg (being the key person for the weekly Jam for more than 10 years) as well as in Strasbourg and others all over the world.
Our events like the blackforestjam (‘96-‘05) www.blackforestjam.de and the contactfestival freiburg (since 2000) www.contactfestival.de have created an international exchange about the dance form Contact Improvisation between professional and non-professionals.

I’m also a Member of the Round Robin Project, networking internationally to find to a global solution for sharing CI information.

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