Lia Sheyen is a movement lover and Certified Conscious Movement teacher, guiding workshops and classes since 2021. With nearly a decade of experience in conscious dance modalities, her exploration of movement was born from a deeply personal need to understand inner restlessness, discomfort, and anxiety, to meet them through the body and find her way back to joy and aliveness.

Her work is rooted in her lived experience, where dance, music, art, and meditation become doorways back to authenticity, beyond societal expectations and learned identities. She is a certified Azul Conscious Movement teacher, a promoter of forest bathing practices, and works through a somatic approach informed by IFS (Internal Family Systems) and art therapy practices.

Her path is also shaped by a love for travel, adventure, wild nature, and artistic exploration. For the past three years, she has been living in Guatemala, on Lake Atitlán, surrounded by the depth and beauty of the Mayan cultural landscape.

Through conscious movement, Lia invites people to reconnect with spontaneity, vitality, and the natural flow of life, exploring the body and allowing movement to unfold without effort. In this space, people can soften the body, feel deeply, express freely, and surrender to the present moment — embracing their beautifully imperfect humanity! To find Lia visit: https://www.instagram.com/liasheyen/ https://mailchi.mp/3fda1cba36af/spirals-of-freedom-azul-conscious-dance-with-lia-sheyen To learn more about Azul visit: https://pathofazul.com/

Julia is a lover of dance. She began dancing at parties in her teenage years. In the 1980s and 90s, Julia co-ran clubs and raves in London. She developed a workshop exploring the rave experience called Spirit in the House.

For the past 3 decades, Julia has practised as a Transpersonal Psychotherapist, with a special interest in the wisdom of the moving body and exploring body symptoms.

She is a Certified teacher in Open Floor movement practice and Ecstatic Dance. She a member of the International Conscious Movement Teacher's Association (ICMTA), and runs regular Flomotion and Open Floor dance sessions in London.

Julia writes regular blogs on themes connected with dance such as Dance and Defence Against Loneliness, What is Dancing with Awareness in the Body, Community Dance and Dance Movement Psychotherapy. Visit https://www.flomotion.dance/ for more information. Or follow Julia on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/flomotion.dance/

Kathryn Dickason is a scholar and journalist based in Los Angeles. She specializes in Western medieval Christianity, with particular interests in dance, iconography, gender, French literature, Dante, and medievalism. More recently, she has developed a secondary research area in contemporary ecstatic dance.

Dickason holds a Ph.D. in Religious Studies from Stanford University and also served as a residential research fellow at the Center for Ballet and the Arts at New York University. Her first book, Ringleaders of Redemption: How Medieval Dance Became Sacred (Oxford University Press, 2021), explores the sacralization of medieval dance in Western Europe.

Currently, she is writing a long-form profile on Max Fathom, the founder of ecstatic dance, as well as her second book, tentatively entitled Wheeling Incarnation: Medieval Dance in the Visual Arts.

Lindsay Jay is the founder of Flow Dance Meditation, a music-guided movement practice rooted in embodiment and nervous system awareness.

With a background in large-scale movement and community creation in the UK, and now based in Ibiza, Lindsay’s work bridges conscious dance and mainstream wellness. She is also the founder of YogaFit Retreats, and her work is shared internationally through retreats, facilitator trainings, and online practices.

Flow Dance Meditation was created from a personal inquiry into safety, presence, and staying connected to the body, and continues to evolve as a living, embodied practice.

Upcoming events: • Jan 18–23: Sacred Spiral Retreat — Sufi Whirling & Flow Dance Meditation (Morocco) • Feb 1–5: Flow Dance Meditation Facilitator Training — Bali • April 15–17: Flow Dance Meditation Facilitator Training — Ibiza • April 19–26: YogaFit Retreats — Ibiza

You can explore guided practices, upcoming events and training information at: 👉 https://flowdancemeditation.com

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🤍 Stay Connected

Follow Lindsay’s journey and reflections on Instagram: • Personal: @lindsayjay_loves • Flow Dance Meditation: @flowdancemeditation

His palette spans 140, african rhythms, percussive heavy club music, jungle, techno, world bass, folktronica and all kinds of experimental edges. It is deep, driving and heart-opening, willing to meet shadow as well as celebrate light.

He is one of the leading Ecstatic Dance DJs in the UK and the first and longest-serving resident at Ecstatic Dance UK in London. He started Ecstatic Dance Bristol almost seven years ago then founded Ace Collectiv a few years later. Ace Collecitv creates alcohol-free, high-production experiences that move with the seasons and weave dance, music, art, ritual and community. Club-level sound and lighting design are an important part of the medicine.

Osara has produced community events that have seen the first appearances in Bristol of the Huni Kuin and Yawanawá (indigenous people from the Amazon Rainforest), as well as the Umbanda group, Roça de Ogum, from São Paulo, Brazil.

Beyond the decks he mentors artists, facilitators and community builders who want to lead with integrity and craft. Influences include nature, animism, mysticism, plant medicine teachings and the global cultures that shape sound system and club music, as well as his own Celtic and Sámi lines. With the intention of creating more spaces for authentic movement, expression, empowerment and connection. Ace Collectiv presents:NYD 2026 - Midwinter FestivalThu 1 Jan 2026 | 11am - 9:30pmThe Mount Without, Bristol🎟 Tickets & Info:https://dandelion.events/e/nyd-festival-2026

Osara

Tim Barnes is a dancer, DJ, DIY motorcycle mechanic and horse back adventurer with more questions than answers. He uses embodiment as the palette of his artistry and is committed to walking his talk. From a nothing to shout about background, the 5Rhythms practice shook his world in 2012 and offered the opportunity to tune into the beat of a deeper mystery.

Coming to the practice after years of travelling, years of uprooting, years of trying to find himself, the rhythms offered a place of stability and excitement in equal measure. A structure to be unstructured. He believes our bodies are bodies of wisdom, and when we use them as such we can transform and transcend. To find out more about Tim visit his website or follow him on Instagram

Toby Gillingham is a somatic researcher, facilitator and practitioner. He has studied as many physical art forms as he possibly could: including vinyasa yoga, Capoeira, Brazilian Jiujitsu, physical theatre and improv. He is constantly searching for the deeper truths offered to us by the physical worlds of our bodies. He is the founder of Mana and Wak - a retreat centre in Hertfordshire where he is offering a program of events that push the limits of what people think is possible to discover with their bodies through the power of physicality. To find out more visit: https://www.manaandwak.com/ or follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mana.and.wak/

Simonetta Alessandri is an Italian dance artist and a somatic educator based in London. She applies the Feldenkrais Method to dance and movement training and to performance-making. She teaches Contact Improvisation, Improvisation, Choreography and Contemporary Technique at Trinity Laban Conservatoire, London Contemporary Dance School, at Goldsmiths University and in other Universities in UK. She teaches internationally and has been a guest teacher in Germany, Colombia, UK, Norway, Israel, Austria, France, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Poland, Portugal, Greece, Taiwan and India. Her work is informed by more than 30 years of dancing, teaching and choreographing. As a choreographer, she has created pieces for dance companies, students, large scale opera, improvised performance and site-specific works. She has also done movement direction for theatre. She taught for more than 20 years in Italy and kept Contact Improvisation alive in Roma for 10 years with her classes and jams. She was one of the few dance practitioners in Italy who began working with Contact Improvisation in the 90’s. She obtained the Post Graduate Diploma at London Contemporary Dance School, she is a qualified teacher of the Feldenkrais Method and she holds the Teacher Certificate of the Royal Academy of Dance. She is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. She is one of the founders of CI@Goldsmiths, association of dance artists dedicated to the promotion and dissemination of Contact Improvisation in London and UK. Follow her on Instagram: alessandri_simo_ Follow her on Facebook: Simonetta Alessandri Check out the CI @ Goldsmiths website: https://www.cigoldsmiths.com/ Check out the London Contact Festival: https://www.cigoldsmiths.com/londoncontactfestival