a long story: begin, pause, continue. reflect. grateful to my teachers. 

Karen Nelson (she/her), plays experimentally within dance improvisation lineages of Steve Paxton, Lisa Nelson, Simone Forti, Nancy Stark Smith, Mary Fulkerson, and many more. And forms including: Tuning Scores, Contact Improvisation, Material for the Spine, and other movement arts. As explorer-collaborator, teacher, maker, touring performer, author/contributor to “Dancing with Dharma” and “Contact Quarterly”, she has been a mutator of the form Contact Improvisation since 1977. She co-founded mixed-ability experiments Dance Ability and Diverse Dance Research Retreat and co-created Tuning Score Observatories with Image Lab i (1990’s) and Tunezoom (2020’s) and within many collaborations that integrate a physical-sensation based approach to dancing. Investigating dominant cultural narratives and re-vers(ion)ing these fictions comes with the territory of playing in her own embodiment and within a wider world community. explomov