Jocasta Crofts

I am aged 35 with an English father and Finnish mother - which makes me Finglish...

I am a qualified Iyengar Yoga teacher, a teacher of Dance Improvisation and Contact Improvisation, and a performing artist. I trained in physical theatre and aerial dance on the one year foundation, Circomedia School for Circus Arts and Physical Theatre, Bristol (1995-6). I also completed the New Dance and Somatic education programme at Outokumpu College for Vocational Studies, Outokumpu, East karelija, Finland (2001-4).I have a two year B-tec in Fine Arts from Banbury College of Visual Arts (1993-5).

I am now in mid-study to become a Somatic Movement Educator, studying at the School for Bodymind Centering, Northampton, U.S.A.

For the past 6 years I have been a travelling gypsy, mainly working, studying and exploring in Australia, India, U.S.A. and the Nordic lands of Finland, Russia, Iceland and Sweden. I take my arts with me as I travel, performing my own pieces, teaching yoga, movement improvisation and dance mixed with meditation.

This year I have been dancing a raging hormone dance as part of a trio with two Finnish dancers. The piece is called "Kypsa," (Finnish for "Ripe",) and is about female fertility and the highs and lows of the biological clock. It has been performed in anti/post-natal clinics and art galleries in Finland and Iceland.

I have also been performing in India with Nirupam, a male Indian dancer. Through these performances and by teaching Contact Improvisation together to Indians, we have been challenging the existing touch taboos of Indian Culture.

The exploration where dance improvisation and meditation meet has become a deep passion for me.

An important part of my travels has been a search to rediscover my lost family roots, taking me to Finland and U.S.A to meet blood relatives of many generations. "Genius Loci" has brought me back to my father-land of old Blighty. It asks me to tune in and reconnect to the land of my birth, to time travel through many ages of past generations, back to a geological age before humans even existed and with this connection express it through my art.

I have known Brian Boothby, since I was 17, when we both lived in a small Oxfordshire village and became friends. I have worked and played alongside   him in his Music Space in the healing field at the Big Green Gathering over the last 6 years.

-return to artists page-