Explain the need to develop your routes to the floor

During the lesson, we went through several 'routes to the floor', which are simply unconventional ways of using the human body to get to the floor and to move across it.

 One of the routes to the floor studied was a forwards roll so from standing up in the 'neutral' position (as already explained the blog) going down onto hands and knees, then lowering one shoulder to the floor, say the right shoulder, extending the right arm out to the side so it is flat on the floor and tilting the head so that the ear is on the ground, as if listening to the floor. From that position, push with the legs so that the weight is forwards over the head and then tip forwards over the right shoulder, tucking the head in towards the chest so as to avoid any harm being done to the neck. In the middle part of the roll, the neck should be taking the body weight whilst the legs come over the head as the neck is an extremely strong part of the body. This, once practised, is a very good and elegant, if done correctly, way of getting to the floor and can be used to travel vast distances across it. It can be used to get out of situations or to move the physical theatre piece on to a new location on the floor. At first I found this quite difficult, but with more practise and getting used to the position it became much easier.

With the forwards roll comes the backwards roll so from a squatting position, tilting backwards so the weight is towards the back. The legs then go over the head as the body rolls backwards over one shoulder, so the side of the neck takes the body weight and nothing is hurt. I found this the most difficult of all the routes to the floor as I was apprehensive about moving in a direction where I cannot see where I am going and rolled sideways many times before getting my weight in the right place so I could go directly backwards.

Another route to the floor is a different kind of roll called a twist, where in one fluid movement, the left leg and the right arm are extended and the right arm goes down the body in a diagonal line, extends onto the floor so the palm is facing towards the ceiling and the body flips over the right shoulder. This was also challenging for me as it required a lot of balance and confidence to be able to perform it correctly. I did it slowly at first, in different stages and then  tried to put it altogether and this is probably my weakest route to the floor but one which I think when I have perfected will be very useful.

I need to develop my routes to the floor because once I have mastered these, I can use them as tools to connect different movements in physical theatre pieces and will be able to use them spontaneously in improvisation tasks which I feel will improve the quality of my movement. I have found from doing a few improvisation sessions with my partner that it feels right to travel in the opposite direction to them from a standing position, and before doing this session I had to just walk away which I thought broke the flow of the movement. Now I have an understanding of the routes to the floor, I can develop them in my own time and use them to create a fluid performance.