Hello!
Please find somewhere to rest
and take some time to be with the sensations and arrangements of your hands touching each other…
begin to notice the different kinds of feedback the placement and touch of fingers and hands create within each other.
Now, take some time to be with the touch of one hand with the other, play with the familiar patterns in which your hands hold each other and find new ones (you may adjust these at any point)
begin to explore the mutual touch of one hand upon the other and the other upon the one hand – notice where the touch feels full, or where it empties…
you may begin to notice the different temperatures of the hands or parts of them
you may notice the sensations of the skin of both hands
you may feel the relative pulse of the blood between the hands and how that connects you through your arms to the proximal pulsing of your physical heart
begin to notice the contact of the hands with the surrounding air, the air is touching your hands, is it still? is it moving?
notice that through the hands touching each other, you are in fact touching the whole body, holding your body in awareness through the hands
you may become aware of the way your body is always being touched by the environment you are in and mutually that you are always in touch with it, or enfolded within it
begin to notice the sounds, the smells of the space you are in, where is the light falling right now?
where are you are resting your hands?
notice where in your body there is contact with the ground and the support of other surfaces or objects in the room
you may notice where you are feeling this physical support, both from the environment you are within and through the soft matter of your own body; the bones, the connective tissue, the organs, fluids
return your attention to your hands, notice the field of touch and holding that is centred here,
be with your hands for a while in this moment – allowing them to move with each other…finding places in which they rest with each other
take your time…
eventually, find an arrangement of your hands touching or holding each other –
be with the sensation world, the feeling, the comfort and the uncertainties here…
If anything emerges that you would be prepared to share please write a few sentences in response- these may take the form of images, sensations, memories, current experience. Please take a photo of the way your hands hold each other ( you may need someone’s help for this…or you could try the timer function on your camera) and send to my email address: simon@simonwhitehead.net
I will sew an impression of your hand hold into a pair of cotton gloves and these gloves will form part of a collection of soft vessels that will be references for choreographic research later in this project. I will share an image of the gloves with you when completed and I will keep you up to date with the process of this project
I hope that this score can be a resource for you to return to over the coming weeks, it could also be the beginning of a dance or a series of movements…
Thank you for making the time
I look forward to meeting you again in person, before long…