What is naftali method?

naftali method is an improvisational dance practice where softness and speed generate inquiry.

The practice invites both dancers and non-dancers to investigate how release reorganizes effort, attention, and momentum in the body. Through imagery and focused attention on the body’s major joints, participants explore softness not as passivity, but as a condition that allows movement to travel with clarity and ease.

From this state of release, speed is approached not as force or exertion, but as a form of attention. Movement becomes quicker and more responsive through softness, requiring minimal muscular effort and allowing momentum and impulse to lead.

Rather than emphasizing output, the practice questions dominant notions of productivity. It asks how efficiency, precision, and responsiveness might emerge through continuity, listening, and release rather than strain.

Within this framework, participants develop tools to generate their own movement language. Expression is shaped through the how of moving—through sensation, timing, and relational choice—rather than through predetermined forms.

Developed by Brianna López in 2020 and later named naftali method in 2024.