Information for Participants June 17th & 18th 2023
Frames. (for Ben)
So we know we can journey from the page, we can travel to spaces inside, and that each space we discover leads to a infinitude of other spaces, each in turn opening to others.
We know that the screen itself is an opening, an invitation.
Let’s begin by exploring the frame of the screen itself, we’re used to looking at the screen but just now I want you to take a moment to notice the frame – in detail. Just let your eyes explore, noticing detail, material, marks, scratches, reflections – maybe taking in something you haven’t noticed before. Trust your eyes to lead you. If someone is reading this to you, you can use any frame, to explore. A window frame for example, or if you are lying down, the ‘frame’ of the ceiling of the room.
You can repeat patterns or vary them, changing pathways discovering the hidden geometry of the rectangular space of the frame. Let the pathways that your eyes choose, surprise you in their directions and speed.
Notice if your eyes have a preferred direction of travel around the frame, or places where you feel you want to spend more (a favourite corner) or less time (an ignored corner). Maybe some sides of the frame feel faster when your eyes travel along them and others slower.
Once you feel familiar with the frame you can begin to explore pathways across the screen, don’t become distracted by the screens content but try and find simple pathways as if you were crossing a room or a piazza, for example across the diagonal, from one corner to another, and combine this with travelling up, down or along a side. Perhaps you can find the mid points along the side and travel across the centre (upstage and down stage) or from side to side (stage right to stage left).
Now that you are familiar with the frame try doing the same thing with your eyes closed.
Imagine a frame and start by tracking around the edges, noticing any differences or preferences, sides or corners that you seem to be more drawn to, routes that you are more comfortable with, notice these things without judging them.
When you have explored the edge of your frame try again to cross the interior space along the diagonal lines connecting corner to corner
and then begin to add-in any other pathways that you can imagine, perhaps north south or east west through the centre (as if you are travelling stage right to stage left or upstage to down-stage)
Notice the different speeds that you can travel and play also with moments of stillness in your journeys. Find places where it feels comfortable to rest and feel the space around you.
Notice again the substance that you have attributed to the frame – is it solid? Hard? Soft? Does it have a colour? Is it translucent? Patterned perhaps? Again, just notice how your frame feels. Is it constant and fixed like the computer frame or has it changed? Is it changing as you explore it?
Take a moment now to notice its location, where in relation to your body, have you placed your frame whilst working with it?
Perhaps you can place it somewhere new, further away for example, or to your side,
behind you,
above you,
below you?
Take a little time to play with positioning and repositioning the frame.
Perhaps you are already doing this, but see if you can perhaps also explore changing the dimensions of your frame, making sides longer, shorter, expanding and shrinking its surface area. What are the limits to this?
If the frame is outside of you, perhaps you can now think about positioning it inside you. You can place it in any part of you. For example, if you are sitting you could place it in your torso, the top edge running from shoulder to shoulder, and the long sides running down to your hips, or you could place it in a limb, for example between your shoulder and elbow, or in a smaller bone like one of the bones of a finger or foot, perhaps in your head.
Be gentle and simply offer up the frame to different locations with yourself and see where it ‘fits’.
Is there is a place that can comfortably accommodate your frame – and yes you can shrink or expand your frame to fit your body.
If you find this difficult, don’t force it if it does feel right – you can continue to work with your frame outside of your body if you prefer, and shift to inside any time you feel is right for you. It might help you if you consciously imagine the frame to be made of a very beautiful material, or even made of light.
If you find the ‘frame’ to rigid and angular you might prefer to visualise a softer structure that sits easier in you.
Take a while to feel the frame settle into your interior space and then once more, take your mind around the frame, noticing the details of this journey, explore each side, each corner, and notice as you move along the sides, any subtle changes that occur – welcome these changes as you become aware of them.
When you feel the frame has settled you can try traversing the space again from corner to corner and discover other less obvious possible pathways.
Our next exploration is to see if its possible to introduce some movement into the frame, by either lengthening different sides, twisting or rotating the frame. Play a little with this to create subtle movement in your body. This might be very small, almost unnoticeable, micro-movement to begin with. Try to initiate movement from the frame itself and continue to play through three dimensions, elongating, twisting, rotating, shortening and see how your body responds.
I am going to invite you now to come to rest, noticing if the substance of the frame and space within it have changed – take time to sense and feel as you rest – stay calm and breath naturally.
If you want you can stop or rest here and should you choose, you can re-surface. Take time to thank your body and mind for taking you on the journey. Connect again to your breath, to the sounds of the room or space that you are in. Remember how this started with the exploration of the frame of your computer. When you are ready take a little time to take in the detail of where you are before carrying on with your day.
If you want to continue, imagine another frame – and place this new frame in another part of your body (or outside if it is preferable for you), it might be connected to the first frame or somewhere further away.
Travel around the second frame with your mind noticing details and orientation, again notice without judging, whether the substance and dimension of this second frame differ from the first.
When you feel ready see if you can begin to shift one frame in relation to the other, so that first one and then the other frame moves – or perhaps they begin to interact with one another. Take some time to explore the two frames and how they might connect and interact.
Notice again how sides may lengthen or shorten, and how the shorter sides can act like open hinges to help you fold – and that these openings can lead you into other new frames, so you can begin to journey by flowing or pouring your attention from one frame into the next, adding extra frames as you go whenever you choose to do so. Perhaps you can find relationships between the frames and the skeletal structure of your body.
Perhaps you can feel a sense of flow running along the lines of the frames – particularly when a frame tilts down or away from the body.
See if you can pour sensation, this might feel like oil running through the frames, or it might feel like a lengthening of the long lines, as though the frame is telescoping and extending away from you.
See if it is possible to extend a frame to the floor, and back
To the window
and back
To outside the window
and back
To the horizon
and back
And now take a while to play, moving from internal spaces defined by your frames and guided by the frame travelling out and back, extending when you choose to distant points or places.
And allowing those sensations to flow back through the flowing lines
the tracks and pathways that have their roots in the frames within your body.
Little by little returning along these lines
Settling into yourself once again
Feeling the frames settle
Feeling your breath calmly passing
In and out.
Now imagine one last frame just in front of you
In a moment we are going to pass through this frame back into your room or studio
you might want to acknowledge and thank the frame as you pass through it.
When you are ready move slowly through the final frame taking note of its shape, and dimensions, its colours and patterns.
Lastly, before opening your eyes, listen to the sounds around you and gently open your eyes.
Take time to return into the space of your room – no need to look at the screen.
Just enjoy being in your body for a while
look around at what surrounds you without judging
The window frame
The outside space
Your breath
Your inside space
Breathe
