Battle Tactics.

by Julien Adjovi, Loubna Baba Ahmed

This workshop invites participants to get moving and gain a deeper understanding of how important competition, emulation and a combative mindset are in krump culture. A tactical introduction to battle will be organized, in order to help participants shape their dance as confrontation and to dis-cover to what extent that perspective shapes their body language. From simple tools and improvisation prompts as well as movement analysis, participants can get a clearer picture of how krumpers train for competitions and elaborate tournament strategies; they’ll also understand how rivalry can boost competitors and bring about a jousting dynamics with an opponent. They will experience confrontation through dance, moving in space and embodying certain attitudes, as well as interact with the audience – which increases the circulation of energy – and understand the atmosphere that fosters the transcendence of physical limitations in krump.

Julien Adjovi, aka Wrestler, has been a krump dancer for fifteen years. He is known for his very specific style of dancing, which he has named “heavy fluidity”; he has created the Krumpfest association, through which he organizes many events such as major European battles like Spring-buck and Wasteland Halloween. Wrestler has been teaching krump for years with a variety of students (chapiteau Raj’ganawak, école Kourtrajmé), while pursuing his own career as a dancer and choreographer.

Loubna Baba Ahmed, aka Lady Gon studied art history in École du Louvre as well as arts and humanities in École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS). She’s been a krump dancer since 2020 and she has done field research within the Parisian and Berlin krump communities over the course of two years. She has written an MA dissertation on the place of imagination in krump movement and she is now dancing with a krump company.