What makes poi beautiful?

Hi there.

What makes poi beautiful when spinning?

This is just me being curious so no special reason I´m asking this question.

If you are a person that don´t like poi and can´t see what´s beautiful with it I would be very happy to hear what you think is missing to make it beautiful or just why it isn´t.

I haven´t got an answer yet but In will post an answer after giving it a serious thought.

//Thomas

Wikipedia says:


To me, there are 3 forms of beauty in spinning.

There is the purely aesthetic form, in which the intersecting of the various lines created by the prop and the body create a pattern pleasing to the eye, but not linked to the difficulty of the movement or the "style" of the performer. It would be just as pleasing if you'd animated it as seen it live.

There is technical beauty. A lot of juggling falls into this category. It is beautiful because of the way the human body is interacting with external items in a way which looks impossible and yet is done with complete control.

Then there is emotional beauty. This is anything someone does while spinning/juggling an emotional feeling. For those who do not know much about spinning this is often a fear/excitement emotion - "Wow, that looks really dangerous". I think its much more obvious to those who are involved in the arts.

Personally I tend to strive for beauty of the aesthetic and technical types in my own spinning, thinking that emotional beauty is something I want to come through on its own. But when watching I love to see that emotional beauty come through - seeing that calm smile in the middle of rings of fire

The most beautiful spinning I ever saw was at one of our shows. We had a new girl doing her first performance and right before she went on she was soooo scared, shaking etc. The moment she began spinning it all vanished away and she executed the routine perfectly, and walked off with 1000 times more confidence than she had entered. Of course, it is completely my own perspective that made this so wonderful!

Really tempted to start going on about classic/romantic viewpoints and the quest for Quality now

Breasts.

I agree with Durbin (but don't tell anyone)

Thomas, good question!
to me the beauty is through interplay of Flow, and Harmony.

Something beautiful, to me ,explores and utilizes these concepts by playing with dynamic, dimension, floor pattern, opposition, symmetry, levels, stories, intention, and skill...

The beauty comes to me when all the aspects fuse together, and ignite. When I sense this flow and harmony, it somehow resonates.

With poi, usually as someones skill develops, their flow increases, and they are better able to make harmonious patterns in three dimensions around the body. When this is well integrated with music and intention, it is like watching a mandala image come to life! beautiful!!!

There is a fabulous book exploring the concept of beauty, by an Irish poet/priest John O Donahue. He muses about why some things seem beautiful, others not, and if the sense of beauty is common to human nature,an inherent or imposed concept/perception, cultural, or spiritual, or???? Worth a read!

love,
a

I'm with Andrea on this.

I've been thinking about this for hours and couldn't come up with anything more that she stated in her first sentence.

thanks for that.

Well... I daresay that in general beauty is different for each person who interprets it.

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" couldn't be any more true.

For some people that don't have any idea on what poi is, just the movements of someones body can make it beautiful...

For me... its seeing the love of poi radiate through... either a nice big smile or a calm sort of peace...

I've been told I look angry when I spin, though... I guess I'm concentrating too much on precision.

Edit: + everything already said.

Found the actual book title: Beauty, the Invisible Embrace.

here is what harper collins says about it:

"In this eagerly awaited follow-up to his international bestsellers Anam Cara and Eternal Echoes, John O'Donohue turns his attention to the subject of beauty -- the divine beauty that calls theimagination and awakens all that is noble in the human heart.

In these uncertain times of global conflict and crisis, we are riven with anxiety; our trust in the future has lost its innocence, from one second to the next. In such an unsheltered world, it may sound naive to suggest that this might be the moment to invoke and awaken beauty, yet this is exactly the claim that this book seeks to explore.

Beauty is a gentle but urgent call to awaken. O'Donohue opens our eyes, hearts, and minds to the wonder of our own relationship with beauty. Rather than "covering" this theme, he uncovers it, exposing the infinity and mystery of its breadth. His words return us to the dignity of silence, the profundity of stillness, the power of thought and perception, and the eternal grace and generosity of beauty's presence. In this masterful and revelatory work, O'Donohue encourages our greater intimacy with beauty and celebrates it for what it really is: a homecoming of the human spirit.

As he focuses on the classical, medieval, and Celtic traditions, on art, music, literature, nature, and language, O'Donohue reveals how beauty's invisible embrace invites us toward new heights of passion and creativity.

Beauty is an exquisite treasury of Forms of the Beautiful. Its surface employs narrative, image, anecdote, and myth, while into the silence of its subtext are sown seeds of reflection that gradually blossom in the heart.

"

I really like what he says about beauty being "the homecoming of the human spirit" Passion, and Grace also seem to be crucial aspects of what makes something beautiful. maybe that is why someone really into what they are doing with the poi, comes across as beautiful even when their skill level may not yet be there... we respond to their passion.

Why poi ellicits this response from us, and calls us in this way, , well, that bit remains a mystery!

I like your answer Andrea and especially the last sentence, make totally sense in my head.

"maybe that is why someone really into what they are doing with the poi, comes across as beautiful even when their skill level may not yet be there... we respond to their passion"

I wonder sometimes why a person that doesn´t have a high skill level still attracts my eyes sooo much and sometimes I truly find it beautiful.

My answer, been thinking of my question since I wrote it here and that answer would be balance I guess.

When I say balance I use the word for describing something that is not to much and not to less, it´s perfectly balanced/symmetrical.

So add this to everything when you play poi, balance in your body relative to the ground, balance in your body relative to the poi, balance between your two poi (don´t only do stuff with your right), balance in spinning/turning to left and to the right, even keep balance in the amount of time you spend on each side of the body and much much more.

That means that what a person would see when another one is spinning like this is something that never lacks of control on any level. Everything is always balanced and there is nothing that seems unbalanced, you shouldn´t be able to tell if the person is right handed or left handed, you shouldn´t be able to tell if the person spent more time in wallplane than wheelplane it shouldnt even be possible to tell which timing or direction the person spend the most time in cos everything is perfectly balanced and symetrical down to every single thing.

When you break down all this parts and when you are aware of all these things and can make it balanced into every single detail I believe that the poiworld would see something very, very, very special!

For me, that would be beautiful from a perspective of a poi geek.

However that´s light years away from where poi is now, haven´t seen anyone even being close to managing this, and even though I have these thoughts it´s still impossible to see myself being able to do this.
So my answer in real-time would be passion as Andrea wrote, when I can see TRUE passion, then it´s most often beautiful.....

Curious, do anyone get what I mean? :-/

I think so.

I like seeing patterns. For me the interplay between prop and person, use of the space, a sheer "look at this, it's shiny" aura go a long way to make poi beautiful.

I getcha, Nevisoul... and thats an intense aspiration there.

aston: Now you've raised something else... Are the things that make glow/fire poi beautiful the same as the things that make tails look beautiful? Or perhaps even socks? (The last could probably only truly be appreciated by a spinner.)

even simpler, seeing someone enjoy themselve is quite pretty to watch, skill & grace notwithstanding.

When do something you´re really passionate for I take for granted that they enjoy themselves so passion and enjoy make spinning beautiful, that´s the easy way to put it if I choose

I defiantly agree with the enjoyment factor!
Seeing someone who is enjoying themselves is very captivating.

But in so far as what I see from people with advanced poi consciousness

I love rhythm and intention.
When a poi spinner is very deliberately presenting a move or movement with confidence and intention like Nick’s spiral wrap or a Yutas antispin, I can see the poi are an extension of the artists movements. This makes me feel as if I am being shown something and in this way I feel drawn in and feel like I am part of the performance (because 'I' as the audience am necessary). I prefer watching this FOR PERFORMANCE rather than someone who is technically very able and keeps breaking patterns and putting new moves in, which I find clutters the movements.

In the same respect, when forethought has gone into the sequences, not necessarily choreographed, just thinking a move or two ahead, like chess. Each transition can be effectively used without rushing or breaking of the flow creating harmony and dance . This is true of every aspect of performance like the footwork and emotions.
And I think that is reflected in the rhythm.

I saw this in my poi sensei’s (Yannicus) movements and because of it, it appeared as if he was composing a melody with his poi. Different movements were like phrases of music. These phrases would take as long as they should, dictated by both the spinner and the poi in harmony creating a visual song. Or like a mandala as Andrea said.

I also get excited by the relationship between poi heads how they can be in love/hate with each other and tell a story themselves. But that’s a different rant

I guess this is the long way round to saying flow.
my 2 sense

I came to a simple conclusion about what I liked about other spinners 'styles' and it was this:

You have to treat spinning like it's the most important thing in the world to you while you are doing it, while making it look like it's the easiest thing in the world.

Passionate and Effortless in other words.

On that, Meg... did you see me twirling at all at CG? If you can't remember me I was the one that borrowed your doubles.

I always get so wrapped up in any kind of twirling... it FEELS beautiful. I guess I'm choosing what I love while I'm spinning as what I love to watch someone else do...

Its interesting that people here have all given similar responses.

That love we all harbour gives us a feeling of connection with the spinner... human connections is what is truly beautiful... reaching out and touching someone.

Meg, I never actually heard you saying or writing something that´s even close to sounding smart, so it hurts to tell this, what you wrote above is so true and also a very nice way of thinking. Can´t believe I´m writing this but thanks

To open this question up... If



Is the definition of what makes spinning of any kind beautiful... What is it that makes the difference between the way someone feels and the way they are seen to feel.

That is to say, if my poi are the most important thing to me in the world while I'm using them... what makes this perceivable?

Because I'm sure its often felt and not seen and occasionally seen and not felt. v

Poetry.
so simple.

Well if you weren't always putting yourself down and thinking you are stupid, you could be smart too.

Yeah it was mostly you ronan and lester from fire groove that made me realise these things.

...

How you show your passion about spinning while you are doing it?

Well to take the above mentioned people as an example, when they spin, you see their movements are controlled, so you see they have spent time practising to make it look easy and controlled, and that shows they care about it enough to do that amount of practise.

Then you see their faces and where they look and how are they are looking. Lester looks at his staffs sometimes and it's a focused look, but not one of concetration, just one to direct the attention of anyone watching and he makes it obvious with his movement as well what part of the motion of the staffs is interesting to him. So you can tell he cares about spinning by the very fact he's watching it in such a fashion.

Ronan keeps his head very still and only moves it infrequently, and only occassionally has to gaze as his poi, only usually when they are in front of him. His head is tilted slightly down, as if humbled by the act of spinning. You can tell he's practised a lot, and it seems almost ritualistic that he doesn't look at them for some movements, even turning his head away from the poi when they come into view. Sometimes he almost looks like he's spinning with his eyes closed, as if in meditation. But knowing ronan, it's probably just cos he likes the smoking too much.

And Thomas, he can look anywhere he likes during his spinning and I think he has trained that alot.

ANd in each one of them, they have practised a lot and trained their movement with their props a lot. You can tell in Ronans and thomas footwork that they want to be in control and be in an elegant, or at least not ugly position at all times.

I mean thomas especially has developed a strong personal philosophy about poi, and you can kinda tell this by his spinning. You can tell by how he practises, what he practises, and how he teaches. So he is clearly passionate enough to devote plenty of his non spinning time to thinking about poi and that shows in his spinning.

Also you can tell in the way that a person spins I think. I can see a certain kind of grace in the way the above three move, a deliberate, slow, controlled grace. They are unhurried, they know where their arms are going next, it's an easy movement to achieve for them, but they concentrate on every part of it to make it the best movement it can be. As thomas says, they are always balanced and controlled, which is a part of making it look easy, and caring about it. (Enough to practise it a lot to make it look easy, and then to care about every part of a move.) And they care about thier posture and footwork and whatnot. They want to present spinning as beautiful, not just cos they want to spin for their own pleasure. Maybe, I haven't thought on this one so much.

In the way Thomas spins, you can see he cares about every part of a movement. When doing some pendulum one point five thing for instance, he won't just be wanting the achieve the 'kiss' of the two poi that makes it a clean one point five. He'll have arranged himself into a good elegant standing posture, when he's not noticing if the movement is clean with respect to the poi, he'll be considering his arm position, are they straight, and straight up and down? Where he's looking and so on. So it's not just one part of the movement that is important to him, it's the whole thing, though (when he was learning it maybe) his concentration will be moveing around various part of his body and the poi. Shame he has to spoil it all with his goofy hippy clothing and cute idiot smile.

I mean, just spinning for about 3 years leaves you with a better sense of how circles work and how to slow down your body to look more graceful. How not to look paniced in your motions while spinning.

Rambly, but there are a lot of things that contribute to seeing someone who is passonate about spinning. There are probably more and more sutble ones that I know unconsciously but can't articulate.

It's hard to say, staring at the ground, the sky, the poi while you spin but while having a feeling of poi being beautiful, it doesn't really come across like that. It's not the feeling that's important, feeling's are just feeling's. I can be feeling super graceful but look like a dork, or be feeling angry but surpress it. A feeling is not always expressed using your entire body and a prop. You have to learn that as a skill, or it can be viewed as a consequence. Even dancers don't just learn moves, they learn how to express with their bodies...

You can be feeling estatic, but that doesn't mean a fast anti-spin flower is going to convey that.

ZOMG offtopic...