🇨🇿 Czech Republic, 20 August – 5 September 2026
Part 1: BEING Residency, 20 – 30 August
Part 2: KIN Scores for Group Improvisations, 1 – 5 September
LETANEC 8th edition invites you to a residential in-depth study of movement and dance as tools for awareness, creativity and transformation.
The study material is rooted in contact improvisation, and it embraces practices of authentic movement, Feldenkrais method, experiential anatomy, ecosomatics, embodied writing, and drawing.
We will live, move and (un)learn together and with the land we are on.
The event spans 17 days, with the option to engage in the entire process or take part in either part 1 or 2.
It is facilitated by Jana Burianova, Nikola Jankovic, Giulia Ravarotto, and supported by a team of fellow dancers and artists.
LÉTANEC advocates for beauty as a form in which the world becomes worthy of care and for art making as one way to make that care visible.
Part 1:
BEING Residency, 20 – 30 August
The BEING residency is focused on the unfoldment of individual and group processes by engaging with the principles of Contact Improvisation and on cultivating states of presence and their creative expressions in the practice.
PART 1 is followed by 2 days of integration time.
Part 2:
KIN Scores for Group Improvisations, 1 – 5 September
Part 2, KIN is designed to cultivate the readiness “one body – one mind” state. Focus is given to the scores for group improvisation, Underscore from N.S.Smith, long jams, and performances.
Both parts are crafted with the intention to co-create a space of mutual support, creative exchange, care, and beauty.
What we will practice
Contact Improvisation
Contact Improvisation is defined as an “evolving system of movement” that focuses on the physical dialogue between two or more moving bodies. Emerging from the postmodern dance scene in the U.S. of the early 1970s, the form was initiated by Steve Paxton as an exploration of the body’s relationship to basic physical laws—specifically gravity, momentum, and inertia.
The practice can be seen as a “choreographic adventure”—a lived investigation where bodies “renew their sensory maps” in real-time. A dancer and scholar Emma Rose Bige maps this adventure through seven fundamental gestures: Touching: The primary interface and “skin-to-skin” dialogue. Seeing: Using peripheral and internal vision to navigate space. Falling: Yielding to gravity as a constant source of movement. Not-doing: Practicing a “release of willfulness” to let the dance happen. Undoing: Stripping away habits and hierarchies. Writing: Tracking and naming the knowledge of feeling. Playing: Engaging in the dance as an open-ended, experimental game. For BigĂ©, these gestures transform the physical laws of Paxton’s original research into a communal space where participants vow to be in service of the relation they co-construct.
Feldenkreis Method
The Feldenkrais Method is a type of movement therapy devised by Dr. Moshé Feldenkrais (1904–1984). The method is claimed to reorganize connections between the brain and body and so improve body movement and psychological state.
By focusing on the quality and ease of internal sensations rather than external form, it helps you discover more efficient neuromuscular patterns that translate into greater fluidness, balance, and creative range on the dance floor.
Authentic Movement
Authentic Movement is a therapeutic, contemplative practice that explores the relationship between a mover and a witness. With eyes closed, the mover listens inwardly and finds a movement arising from a hidden prompting. Developed from Jungian principles by Mary Starks Whitehouse in the 1950s, it fosters deep self-awareness, emotional expression, and connection between the unconscious and the body.
Body Mind Centering
Body-Mind Centering® (BMC) is an integrated, experiential approach to movement, body, and consciousness developed by Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen in the 1970s. It is defined as a study based on the embodiment and application of anatomical, physiological, psychophysical, and developmental principles, utilizing touch, voice, and movement to explore the internal experience of body systems. BMC and Contact Improvisation (CI) are deeply entangled, having developed around the same time in the US post-modern dance scene. They share a focus on internal sensing over external aesthetics and often use the same somatic tools to deepen the quality of weight sharing, momentum, and partner communication.
Ecosomatics
Ecosomatics understands the body not as a self-contained entity, but as constitutively entangled with the environment, matter, and meaning. It moves beyond mere “awareness” of nature to a profound recognition that our bodies are active, material participants in a world that is constantly coming into being. Ecosomatic practices—such as breathing, touching, or moving—function as a form of “ecoproprioception,” where the sense of self expands to include the surrounding environment, dissolving the illusion of separation between human, animal, and landscape.
Who is this event for?
For everybody, regardless of years of experience within the practice of contact improvisation.
For people of all genders, racial and ethnic backgrounds, ages, body sizes, and abilities (although the venue is not wheelchair-friendly).
Since 2019, we have cultivated a space of care and attention, where touch is grounded in listening, consent, and mutual respect.
If you wish to come with your children, please reach out beforehand.
Early Bird Price – Grab one of 10 Early Bird spots!
To support early planning, we’re offering an Early Bird discount to the first 10 people who join us. The prices below reflect this discount; after the first 10 spots are taken, the standard price (+€100) will apply.
| € | CZK | |
| The whole event | €840 | 20,470 CZK |
| reduced price | €740 | 17,950 CZK |
| Part 1 only | €670 | 16,400 CZK |
| reduced price | €590 | 14,400 CZK |
| Part 2 only | €490 | 11,950 CZK |
| reduced price | €420 | 10,250 CZK |
Price includes facilitation, accommodation, and local organic food 3 times a day.
Full Price: choose this if it feels manageable for you.
Reduced Price: choose this if cost would otherwise be a barrier.
Please reach out in case you are facing financial difficulties and still want to participate.
Venue & Food
We will be hosted in an ancient countryside house that has been carefully renovated into an art center by a team of people who deeply care for the land.
It is located on the periphery of the village of Trstenice (Czech Republic), surrounded by nature.
Accommodation is possible in the house’s shared rooms or in yurts and tents outside.
We will be dancing in the spacious dance studio, on an open-air platform, and moving in the surrounding meadows and forests.
Location and how to reach it
The venue is located in the heart of the Czech Republic, midway between Prague and Vienna, and is a 3-hour journey by public transport from either city.
You can reach the venue by public transport, and you can also park your car or camper van safely on the property.
Check Google Maps here.
Team
About Jana Burianova
The vision maker and founder of the festival. She works as a freelance dance artist, teacher, somatic practitioner and creative chef. Her research within a practice of CI spins around ontology and politics of touch, thinking body as presence and CI as a social and performative art practice. For the past 7 years she has been engaged with the practice through the lens of BMC, approaching it as an individual and collective prayer.
About Nikola Jankovic
My background is based on diverse studies of somatic and trauma-informed holistic healing practices. I’m a certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner and somatic coach.
Contact Improvisation has been my primary movement practice for many years. I am passionate about the architecture of learning spaces – containers where learning and growth happen naturally. Currently, I am in my third year of coaching education at Aletheia School of Unfoldment
About Giulia Ravarotto
Giulia is a dancer and artist who moves through movement, painting, and poetry. Trained in contemporary dance, instant composition, and contact improvisation, she explores different languages that meet in the present moment.
For her,contact improvisation and instant composition is a precious space of listening and freedom, a place to practice being with what is and allowing gestures and images to emerge and reveal themselves. It is also a way to access the body’s material, its archive of stories and experiences, and let them be remembered.
She is also a practitioner of biodynamic craniosacral therapy.
Registration
Registration is done in two steps:
Step 1: send the deposit of €165
Step 2: fill in the registration form with the proof of payment
👇
Step 1: Send the DEPOSIT of €165 or 4,000 CZK
CZ bank transfer (click here for details)
ÄŚĂslo účtu: 2701549038/2010
UveÄŹte prosĂm svĂ© celĂ© jmĂ©no do zprávy pro pĹ™Ăjemce
SEPA Payment (EUR) (click here for details)
Account Name: PRAMENĂŤ, o.p.s.
Bank Name: Fio banka, a.s., V celnici 1028/10, 11000 Praha
IBAN: CZ3820100000002200420543
SWIFT/BIC: FIOBCZPPXXX
Reference: Include your full name
Paypal (click here for details)
Pay to: prameni.ops@gmail.com
Reference: Include your full name
The deposit is refundable (minus a €50 processing fee) up to 30 days before the event.
After that, the deposit is non-refundable unless you find someone else to come in your place.
Step 2: Fill in the registration form:
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🙋🏻‍♂️ 🙋‍♀️ Need help?
Write to letanec.info@gmail.com
LĂ©tanec is Czech Contact Improvisation Community Festival that brings together Czech and foreign dancers to share, learn and enjoy contact improvisation and related practices.
We invite people to gather, dance and research. To experience one week of sharing dances, spaces, visions and daily realities. To bring together Czech contact improvisers to enhance the sense of community and to interconnect with dancers from abroad.
What are our values?
We understand life as a web of relations, where every single movement influences everything. In this sense, we practice contact improvisation to contribute to more conscious life on this planet. We want to bring wisdom to all our relating on multiple levels:
Our own body and personal needs. We are all learning to listen to our inner self and to respect our body and soul and at the same time we want to feel safe and respected by others on the dance floor. We want to bring the practice of respect and boundaries in CI to the table and to collective discussion as we feel it’s always needed and useful.
Relationships in the community. We want to develop sensitivity, clarity and good communication to build friendly community environment where everyone can develop their potential.
Local and global ecosystems. The festival takes place in Czech countryside in the season of early autumn when we can benefit from local fresh vegetables and fruits. We believe that ecological aspect is part of CI culture and that what happens outside mirrors what happens on the dancefloor. Ultimately, we feel the responsibility and respect for the Earth that is the ground on which we dance.
For whom is it?
Inclusive environment. LĂ©tanec is open to all levels and welcomes diversity of ages and backgrounds. We aim to open safe space and guidance for everyone. At the same time we expect the participants get the most of the festival by being an active part and taking care of each other. We know that every day and every dance has its unique spirit and we trust in the process to freely reveal itself and to add colours to the festival.