"Masterclass in Doris Humphrey's technique Fall and Recovery"

What if the secret to authentic movement wasn’t in your imagination, but in your body’s memory of gravity?

At our conference, Sandra Kaufmann led an applied technique workshop on Doris Humphrey’s Fall and Recovery - a foundation that continues to shape how we understand momentum, balance, and dynamic change in performance.

As a former member of the Martha Graham Dance Company and the founding director of Loyola University Chicago’s Dance Program, Sandra brings this lineage into the room as lived practice - not just theory.

Participants worked with principles such as Breath Rhythm, Successional Flow, and Opposition, and explored phrases from the Humphrey/Limón repertory, including material connected to Humphrey, Limón, and Weidman traditions. The sequences were passed to Sandra through Ernestine Stodelle (Humphrey/Weidman company; later with José Limón’s Little Group), keeping the transmission direct and embodied.

For directors and movement-makers, these tools translate clearly: a practical physical vocabulary for weight, transition, and phrasing - useful whether you’re shaping ensemble scenes or refining a performer’s presence onstage.