THIS PAGE: GENERAL INFORMATION, VISION & PHILOSPOPHY, THE FOUNDERS, THE MAKING OF
GENERAL INFORMATION:
The Playspace is a smoke-free and shoe-free environment (clean and soft soled dance shoes with light colored soles which are only worn indoors are ok). If you do smoke, please do not smoke right outside the door and right before or in-between classes. Some people are very sensitive to the strong smell cigarette smoke creates. We also request that you please refrain from wearing scents, like perfumes and essential oils. We found that through the dances we have become more conscious and sensitive to just about any sensation, including smell. While it is an asset to become more sensitive, the flip-side is that being exposed to perfumes and strong scent becomes extremely unpleasant and can cause allergic reactions in some people.
Children: Children are welcome at many classes. However, we ask that you abide by the preferences of the class teacher. Dance Jam: The Dance:
When leaving late at night please respect our few neighbors by keeping the noise level down on the street.
VISION AND PHILOSOPHY
Our vision is to provide a space for the local and wider community where people can come to express themselves in a non-judgemental and respectful environment. Our aim is to foster a sense of community, and a celebration of our individuality and what we have to offer through our different backgrounds, culture, beliefs and personal journeys. Our focus is very much on authentic expression of creativity and self and to offer classes and events that catalyze personal growth.
In the spirit of being accessible to everyone we offer low income discounts, work exchange, free hire of the hall for certain beneficial community events, a free guest room and any profits will go towards the formation of a Permaculture community, which can have further reaching benefits for the wider community.
THE FOUNDERS:
KARA
Raised in Napier, NZ, strange electroconductive manifestations and telekinetic behaviour shocked her family into discarding her from an early age – her infant form abandoned in a vacant field. Kara was fortunate to be recognised as the incarnation of a Mayan Totem by a pack of marauding wolves and was rapidly adopted and lovingly educated for much of her early life upon the singular path of Wolfdom. Her fur bound ways came to an end, around the age of 23, when it was decided it was time for Kara to depart NZ and share her mutant teachings with the rest of the world.
An illustrious global career within the disciplines of healing, stone masonry and golden naked goddessness was to follow, before She-Wolf…er, that is, Kara settled in Melbourne with the ambition of teaching animal dance. The Australian Nation is eternally grateful to Kara for her unceasing perspiration, and sleep deprivation, toward organising & directing the PlaySpace into fruitful reality. Kara’s joyful and centered composure amongst a workload composed by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse hath maintained a gentle sanity in an otherwise psychotic environment….we are grateful and indebted! Thus the PlaySpace is born….
KURT
Of indeterminate age and origin, historians of the Galactic Nation dispute his very existance let alone any significant contribution to the furthering of planet Earth and its confused populace.
Nonethless, folklore contains repeated references to his kind, generous and charming nature - thus his inclusion in this Almanac. Ongoing anecdotal evidence from the annals of Earth Lore describe the unique genius of Kurt and the convictions of his testimony. Geanalogical records connect his lineage with Moses and the creation of the Arc of the Covenant. We are proud to honour Kurt as GrandSpiral Architect of the PlaySpace, The Untiring Workhorse, Creative Assassin and Rejector Of All That Has Gone Before.
ANSON
Born forth from the sky, Anson manifested as a gift from the heavens, arriving within a forest grove of earth and wood.
Many early years were spent roaming the land, experimenting with the nature spirits and observing the myriad behaviour of the human race. Much data was stored away for future reference intended for the scripting of a interplantery TV mini film.
Upon official membership of the Human species, Anson enjoyed many forays into career world including those of freelance writer, full time firefighter, stage and film actor, naturopath and telekinetic guinea pig for an anonymous government department. Results of this last role were inconclusive.
Anson brings a wealth of dance and allround artistic aptitude to the Playspace and we are proud to recognise his role as Executive Producer and Manager of All Unorganised Bits.
click HERE to view pictures of THE MAKING
We were living in the San Francisco Bay Area. There is a large and vibrant freeform dance community there, we would dance at least three times a week, often with 150 other people. It's what kept us there and what kept us sane. We have both been profoundly affected by our involvement with this dance community. After having witnessed for years how deeply these dances can affect people lives Kurt made a film documentary about one of these dance communities. Eventually we knew that we had to leave the US, for political reasons mostly.
We tried New Zealand, Thailand and New Zealand again but there were just not enough people to form a solid dance community. So we came to Australia… We stayed in Byron Bay for a short time but it soon became evident that again the community was too small to support our vision, and Kurt did not handle the hot weather well. We then looked for the city in Australia with the most artistic activity and where a dance would be most likely to succeed and we chose Melbourne.
We first tried to rent a hall once a week to create a dance. We had a very hard time finding a suitable venue available when we needed it. Most of the venues we knew either had no heating, an inferior sound system, unsuitable flooring, no parking or were too small. Eventually we realized that the only way for us to have a great space to facilitate the kind of dances we envisioned would be to actually rent a property on a permanent basis.
Pondering the idea we realized that setting up such a venue would create many opportunities that could benefit the community. In addition, we knew that if we ever made any profits we could support our bigger dream, to create a Permaculture-based community outside of Melbourne.
Six agonizing months passed by with about 700 hours of work trying to find the right venue. Living in Healesville made it especially difficult to search for a venue in Melbourne. Two leases fell through at the last minute. Early on we visited the warehouse at 290 Albert Street (the current location of the PlaySpace) but we did not consider renting it because the price was about twice what we had budgeted for. Months later the landlord called us and offered us the venue for almost half the original price. The price was still above our budget but we were exhausted and disheartened and we realized how perfect this venue is: it has heat, parking, it's the right size, it is beautiful, no noise issues with neighbours, centrally located and extremely easy to access by car or public transportation. We accepted.
It took us almost three months to get the space ready and these months were without exaggeration the most difficult and stressful time of our lives. The work was hard and excruciating. One example: the floor - about 930 total hours of labour went into it, about 14500 nails were shot into the floor one by one and about $16000 was spent to create the dance floor at the PlaySpace (this hopefully explains why we are protective of it).
We also thoroughly misjudged the amount of help and support we would get from the community and from our friends to create this unique community space. Perhaps worse, we had numerous incidents where we came to rely on promised help and products just to never hear from the “promiser” again. We did not expect that people would drop their responsibilities and change their busy lifes to help creating the PlaySpace but considering what a long list of possible help options we put out and the fact that the mailing went to about 1000 people or more I guess we just assumed that we would be contacted with recommendations for professionals and laborers or with donations of unwanted items or with tips and usable information. What also saddened us is how little it would have taken to make a dramatic difference to us like receiving a visit, holding our hands for a few minutes, giving us an opinion, etc... However, a few people came through to such a degree that it is questionable that we would have been able to do this without their help. We are deeply indebted to them. Anson believes in this vision to such a degree that he moved in to live on a concrete floor to be a part of it! We had one worker, Ishwor, who worked with us from the beginning and who worked 10-12 hour shifts without a day off for the last three weeks before we opened. During the last week before opening we had more volunteered help and we sincerely wanted to thank everyone for their support.
The work took its toll. When we started out we mostly ate food we had grown in our garden in Healesville (our home on a Permaculture farm) and we prepared food frequently. Gradually we stopped cooking and at the end we did not even have time to go out to eat so we only ate commercially grown, packaged supermarket food if we remembered to eat at all, and mostly candy too keep the energy up. We tried to hire a cook but did not have time to do that. Diarrhoea, indigestion and a general sense of physical illness were common. Especially the last month was apocalyptic. Kurt had not had one day off for 10 weeks until he finally collapsed and Kara had to call an ambulance at 3am. Exhaustion, a severe migraine and dehydration was the diagnosis. He spent the night in the emergency room calmed by Morphine, and slept the whole next day. Kara had to leave the phones and computer and took over floor construction for the day.
In addition to the eating problems, we went months without stretching or meditation and had constant discomfort in the body in addition to frequent injuries. Nerves wore very thin, almost to the brink of perceived insanity at times. We had great difficulty getting a good night's sleep. The last week before the opening we communicated mostly by yelling at each other, if we communicated at all. Anson, amazingly, rarely seemed to lose his equanimity. We regularly worked 17 hour days, and were up in the middle of the night working again when we couldn't sleep. There were frequent tears and a sense of utter despair. Never again will we do a project in the same fashion, with so much pressure to open the doors before we run out of money. We don't mind working hard but not with self-abuse and at the expense of sanity and health.
We have learned so much through this process. We have gained knowledge and skills we would never have acquired otherwise. If anyone is ever crazy enough to try something similar give us a call! We can offer a wealth of advice on how not to do things!
We are very pleased to have finally opened the doors (although the space is far from finished) and the sacrifices from the last months will hopefully soon fade and give way to the joy of being part of the community that is forming around the PlaySpace.