"But what is the PURPOSE of the head to tail connection?" a student asked while Sophia Mage was teaching her floorwork. .
I, Thais, personally do not believe the Head-Tail connection/Zambrano Wave has any "real" purpose.
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MAYBE, it has the function of adding complexity to your movement, which could be useful in certain situations but maybe it is purely aesthetic which to Sophia and I is fine, since we're dealing with dance.
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To elaborate:
Sure, the connection helps people get up from the floor while performing the aesthetics that are inherent in Flying Low but in that case, it's a self-serving function/purpose.
If someone tried to grab you while clinching or kick you in the face while you were lying down, I'm pretty sure that you would do a fast flinching movement to try to get up/away from the floor and not start a sequenced spinal wave.
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But the question posed epitomizes one of our time's biggest challenges in contemporary dance/art, to me at least: The search for purpose and functionality to validate our practice.
The students are looking for the purpose and the teachers are tempted to provide it. .
In the long run, I believe it paralyzes us, as we always have to find functional purpose in order to validate our artistic practice.
But isn't art inherently without purpose (to a certain extent)?
Is that not what art gives us: It gives us uncertainty, chaos, emotions and many other things that are intangible and therefore beautiful?
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If we constantly go looking for purpose in our art, and in the physical training representing this art, then I believe, we are slowly diminishing our own artistic possibilities and slwoly digging our own graves as artists.