About Diana
Diana is a dancer, certified Axis Syllabus teacher, dedicated feminist and student of education -/gender studies. She usually works in diverse functions within the sphere of movement. Her projects moving in and around dance/yoga/pedagogy, artistic exchange and collaborations, as well as organizing and administrating gatherings (focusing on body politics in contact improvisation, as the “Radical Contact Spring Gathering” in Sweden 2016). Diana created the blog movementactivism to share the intersectional inquiry of body politics, axis syllabus and yoga. Find her performance work on the portfolio https://www.dianathielen.com
Teacher's statement
I am fascinated by the human body in all its expressions: how we move, how we present ourselves, how we position ourselves socially, how we change and adapt over our lifetimes in response to various challenges.
The scientific perspective of the axis syllabus provides me with tools for understanding and analysing movement, for adapting specific physical activities to individual (training) needs.
This perspective also enables the questioning of myths or unexamined doctrines that sometimes establish themselves in the worlds of dance, sport and yoga. I believe these worlds may be enriched by the collectively accumulated, “peer-reviewed” knowledge of the axis syllabus.
Through this work and this approach to the body I have come to know my body in movement differently: leaving behind the desire to conform to certain aesthetics, I learned to respect the body, with all its possibilities, and its restrictions, and so discovered freedom in movement.
By looking at it intersectionally, I attempt to respect the body in its political aspects and in its diversity. The reality of our bodies cannot be encompassed by biology and physics alone. In my pedagogical and performative projects I therefore frequently employ tools from critical social theory to question norms and embodied, performative forms of expression.
