Dancing Fascia

by May Kesler

I’m pretty sure I knew about fascia long before I could name it.

I began dancing obsessively at age three and have never really stopped. Along the way, I experienced many injuries. In fact, those injuries led me to become a physical therapist. While studying anatomy, I carried my anatomy book to ballet class and studied the muscle charts, trying to understand exactly which muscles I used to point my foot. I could identify the flexor hallucis longus, soleus, gastrocnemius, hamstrings, quadriceps, and hip external rotators. But I knew that explanation wasn’t complete; ballet doesn’t ask the body to move in isolated parts. It is connecting movements with purpose that makes dance possible.

Years later, through Barnes Myofascial Release, I discovered what fascia was, and my interest was piqued. Then, at the British Fascia Symposium in 2014, everything came together.

I met Dr. Graham Scarr there, who was building tensegrity models of icosahedrons from wooden coffee sticks and rubber bands. He taught me how to make one myself. I was captivated by this model of anatomy in motion and inspired enough to promise that I would one day create a dance using a human-sized icosahedron.

About a year later, I gathered two dancers, six tree trunks, iridescent runner string, and shimmering fascia-like fabric, and constructed our own version of a tensegrity model.

Creating that dance revealed discoveries I never expected.

The first thing I noticed was vibration. When I pulled the string we had woven within the structure, the entire fifteen-foot form responded almost instantly. The movement travelled through the whole system with barely any delay, quivering and shifting with the lightest touch. Larger swathes of fabric hanging within the strands created fluidity and flow. The light shifting through the iridescent cloth echoed the images of living fascia I had seen in dissection videos. Even the makeup and fabric molded to the dancers’ bodies emphasized how interconnected everything was.

This led me to understand more deeply that fascia functions at every scale. It links the movement of a single cell to the movement of the entire body. A cell, in its own way, moves the body.

Using fascia-like cloth for the dance taught us even more. One dancer represented a newly formed cell, or an embryo, pushing and pulling through the fabric to create space for growth. We learned that tension had to be shared evenly. I was jokingly called the “fabric hog” because I had a tendency to gather too much cloth, increasing tension on the cloth for everyone else. John Sharkey later remarked that from that image, he realized that he had never considered that an embryo might experience movement restrictions. Such is the beauty of creating with science.

This was one of the ways the dance emerged collaboratively from our collective scientific curiosity.

Many artists have beautifully illustrated fascia through visual art and film. But, exploring fascia through our own bodies—the most sophisticated tensegrity models we possess—teaches us something unique. We can endlessly experiment with the very structure we are fascinated by; while doing so, we can access healing at every level.

Dance unwinds restrictions, creates community, and communicates through vibration, light, touch, and movement. Its reverberations are felt not only by those who dance, but also by those who witness it.

Through exploring fasciategrity through choreography we amplify our individual and group connections.

We are observing, experiencing and creating fascia in motion as we dance. 

Here is a video of the Fascia Illuminated Dance at FRS 2022 in Montreal

References

Avison, J. S. (2021). Yoga, Fascia, Anatomy, and Movement (2nd ed) Handspring Publishing.

Podcasts- Joanne Avison Podcast- Sacred Geometry 

Barnes, J. (n.d.). What is myofascial release?. Myofascial Release Treatment Centers & Seminars. https://www.myofascialrelease.com/about/definition.aspx

Benias, P. C., Wells, R. G., Sackey-Aboagye, B., Klavan, H., Reidy, J., Buonocore, D., Miranda, M., Kornacki, S., Wayne, M., Carr-Locke, D. L., & Theise, N. D. (2018). Structure and distribution of an unrecognized interstitium in human tissues. Scientific Reports, 8(1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-23062-6

Biotensegrity Archive (2021) About the biotensegrity archive. (2021). Retrieved September 7, 2023, from https://www.biotensegrityarchive.org/about.html

Guimberteau, J. C., & Armstrong, C. (2015). Architecture of human living fascia: The extracellular matrix and cells revealed through endoscopy. Handspring Publishing.

Hedley, Gil.(2021) The Seeming Space,https://www.gilhedley.com/the_seeming_space

Lesondak, D. (2023). Fascia: What it is and why it matters (2nd ed). Handspring Publishing.

Lowell de Solórzano, S. C. (2021). Everything moves: How biotensegrity informs human movement. Handspring Publishing.

Oschman, J. L. (2016). Fascia as a body-wide communication system. Musculoskeletal Key. https://musculoskeletalkey.com/fascia-as-a-body-wide-communication-system

Scarr, G. (2014). Biotensegrity: The structural basis of life. Handspring Publishing.

Schleip, R, & Baker, A. (Eds.). (2015). Fascia in sport and movement. Handspring Publishing.

Schleip, R., & Bayer, J. (2017). Fascia fitness: How to be resilient, elegant, and dynamic In everyday life and sport. Lotus Publishing.

Sharkey, J. J. (2021). Should bone be considered fascia: Proposal for a change intaxonomy of bone- a clinical anatomist’s view. International Journal of Biological and Pharmaceutical Sciences Archive, 1(1), 01–010. https://doi.org/10.30574/ijbpsa.2021.1.1.0001

Theise, N. D. (2023). Notes on complexity: A scientific theory of connection, consciousness, and being. Spiegel & Grau.

UKyOrtho. (2014, August 28). Strolling under the Skin [Video]. YouTube.

Van der Wal, Jaap. (2021, October 18).Lessons from the embryo about growth by jaap van der wal 2017 [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CE- 1wwEZBH0&list=PL2ySrSp5igSH-34jy3XpN-31I9bSfc8CC&index=4&t=339s

Fascia related dance and lecture videos by May Kesler, https://vimeo.com/showcase/7596813 vimeo.com/339984496

Gerald de Jong, tensegrity models https://www.pretenst.com