Moving Practice is a weekly class series for professional dancers. Classes prioritize rigor, diversity of contemporary aesthetics, variety of class content, and commitment. Professional level dancers of all styles are welcome.
Tuesdays, 10:00-11:30AM at The Arena
Berit Ahlgren teaches throughout February.
Each session will begin with a guided improvisation rooted in the Gaga movement language to warm up the body and creative mindset. Students will both learn phrase work, as well as deconstruct Ahlgren’s previously made choreography as a means to collaboratively build new movement vocabulary. Depending on weekly attendance, we may build from week 1 to week 4, or start fresh each session. Expect a physical practice with room to honor your own needs and/or limitations week to week.
Originally from St. Paul, Berit Ahlgren gained her foundational dance training from Minnesota Dance Theater and received a BFA in Dance from St. Olaf College, where she also studied biomedical studies. Ahlgren was a founding member of TU Dance under the artistic directorship of Toni Pierce-Sands and Uri Sands, and performed with the company between 2006—2016. Receiving Metropolitan Regional Arts Council’s Next Step Grant in 2011, Ahlgren had the opportunity to study the Gaga Movement Language in Tel Aviv, and moved to Israel to pursue teacher certification between 2011-2012.
Ahlgren earned her MFA in Dance from NYU/Tisch School of the Arts in 2016, and has since been on faculty at the University of Minnesota and Winona State University, performing with independent choreographers between Minneapolis and New York, and choreographing her own growing body of work for both stage and camera under her organization HoneyWorks.
Ahlgren has had the great pleasure to work with Crystal Pite, Ohad Naharin, Netta Yerushalmy, Gregory Dolbashian, Dwight Rhodan, among others. Ahlgren co-choreographed and performs in Ashwini Ramaswamy’s Let the Crows Come” (hailed by the Washington Post as one of the best dance performances of 2021) and co-created the event “Live @ The Shed” with Helen Hatch which has premiered both bolerobolero (“A heroic work, a spectacle for our time,” 2020) and LDV (“an exuberant work [of] whirling gusto,” 2021). In addition to her work as performer and choreographer, Berit teaches classes in the Gaga Movement Language regularly in the Twin Cities, and well as guest teaching nationally and abroad.
Pre-register at https://www.arena-dances.org/the-arena/
Flexible pricing and free parking! $17 drop-in.