Email: guinevere@baubo.co.uk Website: www.baubo.co.uk Ph: Mob 0792 533 2892

Guinevere's Biography

I have been dancing for 13 years. initially starting my training in London with Jacqueline Chapman in 1993. I started dancing to help ease backpain and found it worked wonders, improving my core strength, flexibility and general fitness and wellbeing. I found Jaqueline to be a very good teacher, introducing the distict art of belly dance gently and with genuine enthusiasm. Jacqueline also reminded me early on in my belly dance journey that we dance with emotion and charcter, that the dance is not just about peforming moves it is about feeling the dance and being one with the music. This sentiment has been echoed during my recent trip to Egypt with lectures from Professor Hassan at his ISOC studio in Cairo on 'dancing with emotion' and also Liza La Ziza's talk on 'peformance and stage skills.'

After moving from London in 1997 I found myself practicing alone until I found a teacher who focused mainly on Egyptian styles. During this time I completed a degree in Creative Arts, which involved a module on Physical Theatre where I focused on dancing with speed and slow motion and worked on my muscular isolation techniques. I also completed modules on shamanism and peformance and contemporary Goddess Art.

In 2002 I started teaching belly dance due to the demand for classes locally in Pembrokeshire. When I felt I had shared all I knew I decided to expand my knowledge and skills as a teacher and trained in Keti's advanced A-Z system in Egypt in 2004. Here I learnt a wealth of new dances, cultural experiences and especially teaching skills and rhythmic interpretation. All useful and of which I continue to build upon, now having learnt the original A-Z and Keti's inspiring Astrobelly.

I find belly dance a liberating art from, full of control yet full of abandonment....it connects me to my feminity, my soul. As part of my Masters in Creative Writing I am completing a little book on belly dance, which I hope to share with you all soon! My inspirations come from dancing with other women who are equally passionate about the art, learning from other dancers in workshops and watching belly dancers peform. My main inspiration is when I watch a dancer, I see how she always has her own style, we each dance our own dance within the discipline and for this we can celebrate our freedom of personal expression...this is the key to peace.