FACILITATION
As part of their practice, CONJAH intentionally create approaches and meaningful exchanges for workshop participants through the medium of dance, poetry/writing, performance and youth work. CONJAH have experience facilitating open movement spaces for general community, advanced physical training for dance artists, building-techniques for tertiary dance students and non-dance students, kindergarten-age children, young people of recently-migrated backgrounds and communities of disabled and mixed-abilities.
Some of the spaces CONJAH (Jahra Wasasala and ooshcon) have collectively and individually facilitated at are:
Moving Tāne, XIII WRLD, MIXIT Refugee Arts, Action Education, Rising Voices Poetry, Pacific Tongues Poetry Festival, NZ School of Dance, Unitec Performing Arts, Chunky Move Choreolab, Touch Compass, Ta’alili Company, Dancehouse’s Independant Choreographers Programme, Footnote Dance Choreolab, M3Mindfulness, Vou Dance Company and Vou Conservatorium of Dance and various dance studios across Aotearoa, Australia and abroad.
UNDAGROUND FONO
In partnership with Ta’alili Company, CONJAH co-direct the pop-up training school Undaground Fono. Undaground Fono is a seasonal workshop structured intensive which focuses on making, training and socially activating dance artists. The three pillars participants gather under are known as MACHETE, LABB and ACTIVATION.
MACHETE - Making and carving space for new life within performance, physical technique and our shared dance landscape.
LABB - Equipping and training the movement capacity of the mind, body and heart. Aligning personal expression with communication and creativity.
ACTIVATION - Asking ourselves, “What worlds are we building towards?” through interactive talanoa/discussions and workshops that build on imagination, social awareness, ethics and collective potential.
Undaground Fono has a dance focus but is open to all creatives. Undaground Fono typically runs as a full 2-day programme.
“Undaground fono is a place to gather, to move, to talanoa and to practice what it is that you are imagining for yourself and those around you.”
To attend or book: undaground.fono@gmail.com
Video filmed & edited by ooshcon
Filmed and edited by Chan Darius
CHOREOLAB 2023: Δ (CHANGE FROM AOTEAROA)
Choreolab 2023: Δ (Change from Aotearoa) features three of Aotearoa’s (New Zealand) leading dance innovators grounded in Vogue, Waving, Creature Movement work and World-Building: Jahra Wasasala, Ooshcon and Jaycee Iman. Each artist will share their practice and spectrum of techniques rooted in various Street Dance techniques, Contemporary Theatre tools and Ballroom Dance foundations to engage in personal research and build choreographic worlds.
Chunky Move Company’s 2023 edition of Choreolab was held during 22–24 March as part of FRAME: A Biennial of Dance, and is presented as part of Δ (Change From Aotearoa), a bilateral project curated by Jonathan Homsey and Efren Pamilacan that centres Street Dance.
Through Te Moana Nui a Kiwa (Pacific) modes of storytelling and talanoa (exchange), Jahra, Ooshcon and Jaycee anchor a web of physical connections, empowering a diverse ecology of aesthetics, and expanding movement potentials.
Participants in Choreolab 2023: Δ (Change from Aotearoa) were invited to perform on Saturday 25 March at Dancehouse as part of Δ (Change from Aotearoa): Archipelago, a durational performance to the sounds of acclaimed music artists live from Basement Theatre in Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland).
