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Welcome to the wonderful world of flow. We've all seen it before - those incredibly hot hula hoopers, some dude in the park defying gravity with a staff, performers in tropical resorts whirling fire, a chick magically levitating a wand. Regardless of the prop or the performer, these all fall under the umbrella term of "Flow Arts." The basis is simple: 1) Find a thing you like to move. 2) Move it in ways you like to move. Personally, I've spun poi for 3.5 years and I'm just getting into rope dart and contact staff. This means I don't know poo poo about poo poo yet. Regardless, I feel there should be a place for these performance arts to be discussed, so I'll do my best to include all of them below. Poi or Why Am I Doing Math Right Now?  Originating from a performance/combat training tradition of the Maori people. Legend states that the warriors of the Maori used this art to develop the wrist flexibility and strength necessary to use their melee weapons in combat. Poi involves spinning weights on cords in geometrical, rhythmic patterns. Various effects can be added to the poi for the audience and spinner's enjoyment; fire, LED lights, flags, and colorful materials are very common to see. It also imparts great flexibility and coordination in the practitioner. I may be biased, but to me, poi seems tied with hula-hooping as the most fleshed out of all these arts, with hundreds of thousands of practitioners the world over. There are hundreds of world-famous authorities (see: Jonathan Alvarez) on this art, many of whom have heavy online educational presence. The most beloved of these is, without a doubt, Nick Woolsey, whom the majority of new spinners have learned from through his YouTube. He's also loving adorably kind and outgoing. In 2004, Nick launched a poi-spinning community website known as PlayPoi Hula-hooping or Rock-Hard Body  Hula-hooping officially became a thing in 1958, with the release of a children's toy intended to be twirled around the hips, neck, limbs, or really any applicable body part. However, the true origins of hooping are somewhat unclear. For hundreds or even thousands of years, very similar performance arts have been practiced by cultures ranging from the Indian subcontinent to Native Americans. Similar to poi, hula-hooping has enjoyed a major boom in practice in modern times. The art has become very popular among young women (and men :bigtran:) for its myriad physical benefits. In particular, hula-hooping is an amazing core workout and provides a lot of coordination and bodily awareness. Again, hoops come in fire, LED, and other varieties. Staff or I'm a fucken ninja  Staff spinning comes in many forms. First, there is the bo-staff like, traditional staff spinning (see gif above). Then, there is contact staff, where the staff is wrapped in a grippy material and twirled around the body without the hands. There is also double-staff. The last major form is known as dragon staff, which is incredibly impressive to see in person. Regardless of the kind of staff spinning one practices, they will certainly be able to kick someone's rear end with the average broom handle. Staffs come in fire, LED, and other varieties. Rope dart or Meteor hammer or No, not like Assassin's Creed or Bondage fetishism  Perhaps the most inherently dangerous of all flow arts, rope dart originated as a legit weapon with shaolin monks. Under the category of "soft weapons," the rope dart (or meteor hammer) is a metal weight or blade on the end of a 10'-15' long rope. Alternatively, the head can be replaced with a fire-safe kevlar wick, or LED lights (seeing a pattern here?). The rope is twisted and manipulated with different parts of the body, allowing the user to strike from unpredictable and frankly ridiculous angles. Watching an actual shaolin monk use one of these things is terrifying. There are accounts of rope darters shattering the skulls of their opponents from meters away, instantly ending the fight. Rope dart has the added benefit of totally badass technique names, such as Lion Shakes Head, Part the Wild Horse Mane, and Ride A Horse and Shoot the Arrow. Buugeng and Rings and Fans or Devilry in motion  Buugeng are S-shaped staves manipulated in mesmerizing and confusing ways I can't always figure out. Rings are based on the same principle, with a bit of close-up magic often thrown in. Fan performance usually includes metal apertures with kevlar wicks lit on fire, in the shape of hand-fans. Juggling and Club throwing or The most coordination you'll ever see  Pretty self explanatory. The origins of juggling go back as far as you can imagine someone passing time by throwing poo poo in the air. A relatively new form of juggling as emerged known as contact juggling, and frankly it's way over my head. Sword and Other weapons or Lots of loving fire  Also pretty self explanatory. You get a weapon-shaped object, wrap it in fire or lights, and go to town. Choreography is often based on eastern martial arts. There are DEFINITELY more varieties of flow art out there. If you can think of anything, let me know and I'll include a section for it. Muffin Rhino fucked around with this message at 20:34 on Feb 13, 2015 |
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Feb 13, 2015 18:29
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| # ? May 3, 2024 08:01 |
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Reserved for a Fire Safety post, when I have time.
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Feb 13, 2015 18:36
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This is interesting to see just when I decided to look into CC for the first time in years. I did fire staff for a couple years when I was going to Burning Man, and since we were practising a couple times a week I got to fool around with poi, hoops, and fans as well. There was no real martial tradition behind what I did with staff, though I was exposed to Kali and Arnis and that did inform the stuff I tried. To me (and I am out of date) it went basically Poi > Staff > Double Staff > Everything Else That's Kind of Gimmicky And Really Not As Good. That said I'd never heard of the Rope Dart stuff, but it seems to me it's very similar to a longer Poi that relies on individual motion of one flame with more distance than the parallel nature of Poi. I did mess around with one of those S staves once and holy god that is confusing, the spinning was all right (and cool!) but the throws and catches were just mental. Lastly, I hate to say it, but all of the sword work I've seen is just lame. I've also seen axes which are lamer. There was one guy who had flaming morningstars who was really cool but he told me he had to stop doing it because it was "too dangerous" and he went back to Poi.
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Feb 14, 2015 09:35
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Rope dart functions like spinning a single poi 50% of the time. The other 50% is very confusing body wraps, "empty knots" that appear to be tied around you but really aren't, and lots of long-distance stalls in weird angles. I'm having fun with it now, especially with a poi background influencing my play. And yeah, I agree that fire weaponry is hard to pull off without looking like a neckbeard or something. One person I've seen who can seriously pull it off is Srikanta Barefoot, who used to be Cirque du Soleil's resident fire dancer. Granted a lot of his stuff is really influenced by ballet and his ridiculous acrobatics. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFaAz7pjTIA The swords start at 2:51, it's some pretty good stuff imo. Also, right after the sword section he does a totally badass full-length double staff throw sequence. Frankly, the guy's one of my favorite spinners and I'd love to attend one of his seminars.
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Feb 14, 2015 12:17
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Saw this. Was hoping for this. Frankly, was a bit disappointed  I figured I had to at least come in and survey the new thread... Glad to see you started it! I'm sure I'll be back to ask about the different styles of each..uh..prop? It seems some lend themselves to the flashier and some to the flow-ier, but perhaps it's all a matter of the dancer/flowist/performer/appropriate-word-here and their choice of expression.
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Feb 18, 2015 05:22
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