Yin Chuan
Guangzhou, China
中 国 · 广 州
Guangzhou Contact Improvisation Facilitator
Guangzhou CI Community Organizer, Subconscious Painting Practitioner
Affective Nature Education Mentor, Certified Psychological Counselor
In 2016, I connected with the Natural Association of Hong Kong and joined the Nature School. As an innovative educator, I led adults and children to share in the natural world, continuously exploring the unity of body and mind through teaching. This marked the beginning of my journey into somatic and mental exploration.
In 2019, I encountered Contact Improvisation and have practiced, researched, and shared it without interruption ever since. I have studied under senior CI instructors from Beijing, Hong Kong, Hangzhou, the USA, Russia, Japan, Brazil, and other regions.
Since 2021, I have been researching Subconscious Painting at artist Wu Chao’s Vitality Academy. My work involves exploring the integration of individual and collective consciousness and subconsciousness, as well as the paths of life practice and evolutionary existence.
Starting in June 2023, I began consistently organizing the Guangzhou "QiQi Jam" CI weekly courses and jams. I continue to cultivate the local Guangzhou CI community through the planning, organization, and teaching of workshops, jams, and arts festivals. I focus on the daily practice and exploration of body-mind oneness, hoping to use Contact Improvisation to create more conduits for connecting with life and more vessels for carrying its essence.
The Nourishment of Contact: A Practice of Being
What nourishes me most in Contact Improvisation is the ability to dance while simultaneously resting. Walking can be a dance; sipping tea can be a dance. Any life activity carried out with awareness becomes an integral part of the choreography. Within physical practices focused on the breath— whether it is seated meditation or walking Zen— the spirit settles, returning to the absolute present.
Through the exploration of touch and returning to movement, the energy of emotion flows with effortless joy. A gentle touch, anchored in the consciousness of the center, allows the body to linger, to ripple, and to unfurl.
I observe the shifting tensions within the body during motion. With each inhalation, I expand the myriad chambers within me— bones, fascia, skin.
With each exhalation, I let all that is comfortable and uncomfortable flow into the floor, returning to zero. It feels like ventilating and sweeping every hidden corner of the soul. I sense the time it takes for the "Breath" to arrive— reaching the torso, the extremities, the fingertips, the crown of the spine, and the tip of the tail.
Layer by layer, the body unfolds like a flower blooming in the dark of night. Yes, the arrival of breath requires the time of somatic perception. This arrival is like a primordial gift—a new breath granted to you— allowing every corner, every room of the body, to be reborn with vitality.
Yin Chuan
Photography courtesy of YIn CHuan
