Psychology and Psychiatry/Dance
Book Details

Thinking in Four Dimensions

Creativity and Cognition in Contemporary Dance

Academic Monograph

Robin Grove, Catherine Stevens and Shirley McKechnie

This exciting collection of essays suggests that dance-making can be a form of imaginative enquiry - a thinking in time and space - both for those who perform it, and for those who watch.

About this Title

This collaboration between artists, choreographers, researchers, experimental psychologists and cognitive scientists investigates ways in which choreographers and performers make innovative, expressive movement, and audiences interpret what may well be a previously unmapped experience. Thinking in Four Dimensions is the first book to address the cognitive processes that underpin the creation of new works of contemporary dance.

With case studies including data gathered from dance audiences as well as psychological analysis of new dance works, plus interviews with artists and video of performance pieces, Thinking in Four Dimensions is a unique package.

Thinking in Four Dimensions is available in two formats. The e-book version incorporates text, full-colour images and video, which gives access to unique footage of choreographers and performers creating important new Australian dance works. The d-book is a print-on-demand version of the text with black and white images.

This exciting collection of essays suggests that dance-making can be a form of imaginative enquiry - a thinking in time and space - both for those who perform it, and for those who watch.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction – Robin Grove and Shirley McKechnie
Prologue: Two Traditions – Robin Grove
1. Why Do We Like to Dance and Sing? – Stephen Malloch
2. Light and Shade in Communicative Musicality: A commentary on Stephen Malloch’s ‘Why do we like to dance and sing?’ – Agnes Petocz
3. Show Me What You Just Did – Robin Grove
4. Moving and Thinking Together in Dance – John Sutton
5. Navigating Fine Lines – Sue Healey
6. Dancing Memes, Minds and Designs – Shirley McKechnie
7. In the Air: Extracts from an Interview with Chrissie Parrott Interviewer: Shirley McKechnie. Edited by Michelle Potter
8. Observer Response to Contemporary Dance – Renee Glass
9. Growing Choreography – Mark Gordon
10. Dance Perception and the Brain – Ivar Hagendoorn
11. Cognitive Science and the ‘Dancing Brain’ – Ryan D. Tweney
12. Trans-disciplinary Approaches to Research into Creation, Performance, and Appreciation of Contemporary Dance – Catherine Stevens
13. Chronology of Creating a Dance: Anna Smith’s Red Rain – Catherine Stevens
14. Unspoken Dialogues: A Response – Hilary Crampton

Appendix 1: Some Outcomes (Publications 1999–2004)
Appendix 2: Creating Red Rain (choreographer Anna Smith’s notes)

Bibliography available online at
www.mup.unimelb.edu.au

Book Preview

978-0-522-85144-1