BODY & LAND
A weekend workshop in the South Downs
Part of LIVE EDITIONS
Dancers in Landscape session (May 2026): Korina Biggs, Mim King, Yumino Seki, Clare Whistler. Photo Nikki Tomlinson
Summary
BODY & LAND is a weekend workshop for anyone curious about exploring movement in relationship with nature, offering a chance to move, connect, and express yourself creatively within the beautiful chalk landscape of the South Downs. Scroll down for further information.
Dates
Saturday 19 & Sunday 20 September 2026
11am – 5pm
Venue
East Dean Village Hall
Village Green Lane
East Dean (near Eastbourne)
BN20 0DR
+ accessible outdoor locations in the South Downs National Park
Capacity
14
Cost
Pay What You Can
£65, £85, £110 for the weekend. 3 free bursary places are available on a first-come first-served basis, for people who wouldn’t otherwise be able to come. To request a bursary place, please send me an email. No explanation is required.
Book via Eventbrite here
Age recommendation
18+
Physical access
East Dean Village Hall has step-free access to the hall space and toilets, and a wheelchair-accessible toilet. The outdoor locations we will go to are close to the village hall and are in the South Downs National Park. The grassy terrain is fairly even, and we will avoid steps, and steep inclines and declines.
To discuss any access requirements in advance, please contact me here
East Dean Village Hall, South Downs National Park
BODY & LAND is a weekend workshop for anyone curious about exploring movement in relationship with nature, offering a chance to move, connect, and express yourself creatively within the beautiful chalk landscape of the South Downs.
No previous experience in movement-based work is required though experienced practitioners are also very welcome.
BODY & LAND will be co-led by four of the Sussex group Dancers in Landscape; Korina Biggs, Mim King, Yumino Seki, and Clare Whistler, who will bring their distinct practices and experience of facilitation in wide-ranging local and global settings.
We will be using the spacious East Dean Village Hall as a base for indoor warm-ups, refreshments and rest, and nearby locations for outdoor movement sessions, weather-permitting!
The weekend will include sessions in somatic practices* and improvisation which the facilitators are particularly experienced in - Alexander Technique* and Butoh* – and will draw on influences and inspirations from writing by renowned figures including the poet Ada Limón, botanist and author Robin Wall Kimmerer and environmental activist and scholar Joanna Macy.
Together we will be exploring how to move with ease, and how to feel grounded, tuning into where we are, and finding a sense of place through movement itself. We will attend to becoming more receptive through the senses, to noticing and connecting with the more-than-human, and to following creative movement impulses that arise through tuning in and responding to the land.
We will explore the rhythm, pace and terrain of the land, and the transient nature of the elements. Through guided improvisations, we will explore themes from nature, working with stillness, sense of presence, and ‘being’, rather than ‘doing’, discovering a natural rhythm, quality of breath, and awareness to all that is around, and that which we hold inside. This resonates also with Butoh concepts such as Ma (in between space), Wabi (humbleness/simplicity) and Sabi (process of decay).
In keeping with the spirit of Dancers in Landscape (DIL), this workshop will be shaped by a sense of community, playful curiosity, and responsiveness to both the group and the weather. There will be time for rest and reflection, and conversation over refreshments and food.
We look forward to welcoming you!
This workshop is part of LIVE EDITIONS, a new programme of movement, sound and performance in Eastbourne and the South Downs, supported by Arts Council England.
*The Alexander Technique is a practice that enables awareness, ease and a letting go of patterns of tension that are getting in the way of freer movement, breath and support
*Butoh is a form of Japanese avant-garde dance which emerged from post-war chaos in Japan in the late 1950s when the country grappled with the clash between new Western technology and traditional Japanese values. Butoh became a new form of expression, neither an imitation of Western culture nor a traditional Japanese cultural practice.
*Somatic practices: a field of movement studies and bodywork that foregrounds inner awareness and internal physical sensations, perceptions, and experiences of the body.
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Dancers in Landscape have been meeting regularly in the Weald since 2010 to practice movement outdoors. This group formed out of an instinctive desire to dance in community, responding to, and relating with, the earth. Originally all based in Sussex, some of the core members of the group are now based further afield but continue to join sessions when they can. The full group is now Korina Biggs, Sophia Campeau-Ferman, Laura Gwynne, Mim King, Jo Shapland, Yumino Seki, Nikki Tomlinson, Clare Whistler.
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After graduating in Sociology and Anthropology, Korina Biggs worked as a physical theatre performer with Frantic Assembly for many years and has since been working as an Alexander Technique teacher and creative somatic movement facilitator. She is a member of the Society of Teachers of the Alexander Technique (STAT) and has an MA in Dance and Somatic Well-being. She currently teaches the Alexander Technique as well as movement and devising at RADA, London, and The Performers College, Brighton, as well as having a private practice. She runs professional development sessions for Alexander teachers working with performers and is part of STAT’s Equality, Diversity & Inclusion advisory group. Her passion is improvisational movement practice especially outdoors both in nature and in urban landscapes, and lindy hop!
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Mim King is a Brighton-based artist who has been practicing since 1984. Moving from circus to visual theatre through to dance, live art and film, her most formative training was with Anton Adasinsky & his performance company DEREVO at their former studio in Russia in 1990. Mim’s work is also influenced by Butoh dance and her main teacher in this form was Masaki Iwana. Mim has taught and presented performances across Europe, Asia, USA and Australia. Her award-winning dance films have been shown at Lincoln Centre (New York), Pompidou Centre (Paris), ICA (London), the Venice Biennale and the Sydney Opera House. She has a ongoing collaborative relationships with Gallery Kruh, Kostelec nad cernymi Lesy (Czech Republic), SoToDo Gallery Berlin and the Congress of Visual and Performance Art. Mim is a founder member of BUTOH Brighton. Currently head of movement at Academy of Creative Training, Brighton, she also runs classes regularly at The Cockpit Theatre, London.
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Yumino Seki is a St Leonards-based dance artist, Butoh practitioner and qualified somatic movement educator. Born in Japan, and trained in classical and contemporary dance, she teaches, directs, makes and performs. Between 1999-2009 she performed in works by leading Butoh choreographers Tadashi Endo, Yumiko Yoshioka and Carlotta Ikeda. She later studied Vital Movement Integration with Patricia Bardi in Amsterdam, since which she has combined her Butoh and somatic work with outdoor practice. Her work now traverses dance, improvisation, site-specific performance art, installation and ritual and has been supported by Arts Council England, The Japan Foundation (Cairo), Chisenhale Dance Space and Hastings Borough Council. She also performs in work by visual artists, including works by Zadie Xa at The National Gallery, Venice Biennale, Art Night London, Dance International Glasgow and Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.
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Clare Whistler works across performance, site-specific projects, poetry, music and visual art. Her international career as a dancer, choreographer and director has included 15 years working in opera and education and community projects, including a decade as assistant director on operas directed by Peter Sellars. She has been artist in residence at The Library of Water (Iceland); Banff Centre (Canada), and the Centre of the History of Emotions, Queen Mary University (London). With artist Charlotte Still, Clare is co-creator of the long-running and award-winning WATERWEEK in Sussex. She teaches on local creative writing courses, and on the liberal arts programme at Stanford University (US). Ongoing collaborations include eco-poetry kin’d & kin’d with Kay Syrad, Turner & Whistler with visual artist Nicola Turner, with Rebecca Marsh’s Dear Future Films, with All Dementia Projects at the Royal Academy of Music, and Elephant Press which she co-founded with designer Raphael Whittle.
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The Village Hall is in the village of East Dean in East Sussex. It’s at the foot of the South Downs and is within the South Downs National Park. It is surrounded by rolling countryside about 4 miles to the west of Eastbourne and is accessible by buses which run every 10 mins between Eastbourne and Brighton
Getting there
East Dean Village Hall is 300m from 12, 12A and 12x bus routes which run every 15mins between Eastbourne & Brighton
10mins by bus from Eastbourne Station
20mins by bus from Seaford Station
1hr by bus from Brighton
Drivers are welcome to park in the free car park by the hall
Accommodation
If you would like recommendations for local places to stay, please get in touch