Creative Process

When we learn deeply, our critical intelligence, our intuition, and our physical senses are all engaged and synchronized. Creative process sessions help prepare the ground for this kind of integrative learning. Exercises based on artistic disciplines — dance, theatre, jazz, calligraphy, spoken word — awaken and clarify sensory, intuitive awareness. Creative process also provides a bridge between the simplicity of mindfulness and the complexity of organizational dynamics. We can begin to make this bridge by bringing wakeful awareness into physical movement, into precise moments of listening and seeing, and into nonverbal collaboration.

2009 Workshops

Calligraphy Mind with Barbara Bash

What is the experience of making our mark in the world? How do we show up? How do we follow through? How do we view what we've done? Working with large brushes and buckets of ink, we will bring forth our direct inquisitive calligraphic minds. The oriental principles of heaven, earth, and human provide a deep structure and guidance. Through the steadiness of straight lines and the risks of spontaneous marks, we appreciate the moment – and our lives – in fresh ways.

Leadership as a Performing Art: Short Practices for Bringing Mind and Body to the Present Moment with Steve Clorfeine

Where does the training and wisdom of a performer meet the training and wisdom of a leader? What does it mean to be on the spot, focused, attentive and at the same time relaxed, open to an event and its surroundings? A series of direct and simple movement-theater exercises will reveal the tranformative power of play.

Spontaneous Communication with Jerry Granelli

The ground of communication is openness to oneself and others. Musicians are constantly listening to the world around them and the world within, and surrendering to what is. In this workshop we will practice listening, hearing, and spontaneous composition and form, in order to open ourselves to the message of the moment.

The Art of Making a True Move with Arawana Hayashi

Authenticity begins with an integrated relationship between body, mind, and environment. Discover your natural creativity through a gentle process of paying attention to the body, in stillness and in ordinary movement. In this workshop we will learn how to access fresh responses to the challenges of leading in the midst of the speed and fragmentation of contemporary life.

Who Are We, Anyway? with Lanny Harrison

Let's play with going beyond the limited view of who we think we are, and discover some of the myriad characters who dwell within. True play combines structure and freedom – refreshing, outrageous, sublime – often revealing our deepest selves. We are actually fluid, changing beings in equally impermanent environs. Through exercises that emphasize imagination, improvisation and transformation, participants will experience the connections between live theater performance, contemplative practice and leadership roles.

The Power of a Story with Laura Simms

Working with the structure of a fairytale, (the symbolic and psychological tales that map spiritual transformation in most traditions) we will use personal imagery, event and place to uncover the stories we live by; not only the ones we know, but the more hidden tales that trick and obstruct us, but are the source of internal medicine. Each person will have an opportunity, working in pairs,  writing alone, in group discussion, and landscape exercises, to create a personal tale. Our conversation will be ripe with revelation about how inner knowledge is liberation for self and for community; and how story and storytelling has the potential to transform, heal, and engender awareness and abiding compassion.

The Presenters

Barbara Bash is a published author and performance artist who lives in the Hudson Valley of New York. She has worked for many years as a calligrapher and teacher of book arts and nature journaling. She was co-director of the book arts program at Naropa University and has collaborated over the years with musicians, storytellers, and dancers,exploring calligraphic performance art. Her study of Dharma Art with Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche and Chinese pictograms with Ed Young contributed to her understanding of eastern principles as applied to western forms. She has written and illustrated many award-winning books on natural history for children and adults. Her most recent book is True Nature : An Illustrated Journal of Four Seasons in Solitude. She teaches Big Brush calligraphy workshops throughout the U.S. Barbara has been involved with Creative Process at the Institute since 2002. She has also been collaborating with Bob Wing and Toke Moeller in developing a leadership workshop that draws on the principles and practices of the "Circle, Brush, and Sword."

Steve Clorfeine is part of the Cultural Envoy Program of the U.S. State Department and recently spent two months creating a perfomance with theater students in Kolkata's Rabindra Bharati University. Upcoming is the same residency in Nepal. Steve has been writing, performing and directing theater pieces since 1975. For many years he performed in the companies of Barbara Dilley, Meredith Monk, Ping Chong and at Naropa University where he has been on the adjunct faculty since its inception. His own performances and workshops have toured the U.S., Europe, and Asia. Steve has long standing collaborations with Lanny Harrison, with jazz singer Jay Clayton, tap diva Brenda Bufalino, musician/composer Steve Gorn, and with the arts team at the ALIA Institute. He leads theater, poetry and storytelling residencies in public schools in Europe and the U.S. as well as workshops for theater teachers in Germany, computer engineers in Zurich, and actors, teachers, and business leaders in India and Nepal. Steve is guest faculty at Akademie Remshied in Germany. He is the author of In the Valley of the Gods – Journals of an American Buddhist in Nepal, several poetry collections, most recently, Field Road Sky, and a sourcebook on creative process.

Halifax-based percussionist-composer Jerry Granelli grew up in San Francisco where he studied with Joe Morello and drummed for pianists Denny Zeitlin and Vince Guaraldi (he's on A Charlie Brown Christmas – on Fantasy Records and the Charlie Brown TV soundtracks). He pioneered world jazz fusion and electro-acoustic percussion during the 60's hippie era, established the music department at the Naropa Institute in Boulder in '76, and has had a continuous teaching career since then in Boulder, Seattle, Halifax and Berlin. In the early '80s he performed and recorded in a trio with Ralph Towner and Gary Peacock for ECM. He has recorded as a leader for Evidence, Intuition, ITM, Koch, Love Slave and other labels, and performed and recorded with longtime musical associates Mose Allison, Jay Clayton, Jane Ira Bloom, Glen Moore, Anthony Cox, Dave Friedman, and Jamie Saft, as well as projects with Bill Frisell, Robben Ford, Julian Priester, Charlie Haden, Kenny Garrett, and Buck 64.

Lanny Harrison began her career in the New York Pantomime Theater in 1966. She has played character roles in Off-Broadway musicals and films and, for the past 25 years has written and performed one-woman shows, touring America and Europe. In the fall of '08, she premiered ISBA, a new solo show, at La MaMa ETC in NYC.  Ms. Harrison has collaborated with the late musician Collin Walcott, with Steve Clorfeine, Lily Pink and with Meredith Monk. She has been a member of The House, Monk's company, since 1969. For the past nine years, she has been part of the Creative Process team at the ALIA Institute. Ms. Harrison teaches theatre to children in upstate NY, in the Gallatin Division of NYU and at The New York Shambhala Center.

Arawana Hayashi is a dancer and choreographer, with roots in Asian and Western arts. Arawana has been on the faculty of the Shambhala Summer Institute for Authentic Leadership since its inception. She also teaches extensively within the international network of Shambhala meditation centres and is leading the development of Embodied Presence Practice and Social Presencing Theater in collaboration with C. Otto Scharmer (MIT) at the Presencing Institute.

Laura Simms brings her story-telling expertise to collaborative projects worldwide, exploring social issues, peacemaking, creativity and community dialogue. Bridging ancient oral tradition and performance art, she is a spokesperson for the healing properties and meaning of oral tradition at theaters, festivals, schools, symposiums, corporate events, museums, conferences and special events throughout the world. Laura has written and served as contributing editor for Parabola Magazine since 1996. After 9/11, she spearheaded the publication of Stories to Nourish the Hearts of Children in a Time of Crisis (Holland & Knight), and, in fall of 2003, created A Key to the Heart and Other Afghan Tales (Chocolate Sauce) to benefit children's education in Afghanistan. Her newest book, Becoming The World (Mercy Corps, Inc.), has served thousands of teachers worldwide in addressing issues of tolerance and resilience.  Her most recent adult title, The Robe of Love: Secret Instructions for the Heart (Codhill Press), is a book of traditional love stories published with rave reviews. She has received many awards for her books, tapes and projects.