“Wren has a truly remarkable ability to create an open and positive environment where students feel safe to explore new ideas through movement.”

Megan Slayter

Chair and Assistant Professor of Dance, Western Michigan University

 

 

Wren is celebrating his 24th year dancing in partnership and loves serving humanity as a somatic permissionary. Teaching partner dance internationally as a practice for mindful, authentic living, and enlivening communities by facilitating his signature modality, Cocréa, is his joyful service now for over a decade. Using this potent synthesis, Wren provides navigational assistance to humans nurturing a curiosity in gaining more access to the power and potential of their bodies. Using movement as a vehicle, he guides people towards right-relationship through listening and responding to, as well as inviting, allowing and embracing change. He is a celebrated TEDx speaker, featured author in “ReInhabiting the Village” and ardent proponent of pioneering a new renaissance through authentic connection and consensual touch. 

photo: Tobin Poppinberg

Wren is a cis-gender, able bodied white male residing and working on the traditional ancestral lands of the Muwekma Ohlone people (Los Gatos, CA). As a non-binary identified, 11th generation American descended most recently from artist and blue collar working class parents, Wren is in a deep reckoning with the numerous and nuanced aspects of self that influence how we navigate interpersonal relationships and cultural identity on the journey into right-relationship.

Wren promotes collaborative, mindful movement as an embodied approach to spirituality and medicinal salve for our modern ailments of disconnection and dislocation. He currently serves as an addiction recovery counselor at the Los Gatos based recovery clinic, Embodied Recovery and is available for private embodied movement sessions.

 

photo: Tobin Poppinberg

My invitation is an opportunity for two dancers to come together in Spinaesthesia: the act of feeling and seeing music as movement in the body, and weave intimacy with sovereignty from a place of deep feeling. I teach dance as a metaphor for life and relationship to impart tools for connection and embodiment in the present moment. I believe our minds and bodies working in harmony and balance is the technological breakthrough that will catalyze the greatest innovations in the times to come.

My genius shines when guiding people into their willingness to play, engage, connect, and push edges. I anticipate and celebrate a world where the cultivation of mind AND body intelligence is paramount in the continual revolution and rebirth of how we live, work and relate.

 
 

photo: Eric Partham

Wren owes a huge debt of gratitude to the teachers that have helped shape his dance and his teaching:

  • Stacey Printz (Contemporary, Jazz, Hip Hop, Ballet)

  • Rick Wallace (Jazz, Composition)

  • Frey Faust (Axis Syllubus)

  • Amy Secada (Capoeira, 360 Method)

  • Jose Barroso (Cuban Salsa)

  • Mijiler Vega (Cuban Salsa)

  • Eric Fenn (Urban Contemporary)

  • Anakha Comen (Mindfulness and Faciliatation in a Corporate Setting)

  • Sahajananda (Hridaya yoga and meditation)

  • Zahava Griss (Empowerment)

  • Shantala Davis (Lindy Hop, Fusion, Zouk)

  • Dave Madison (Lindy Hop)

  • Ted Maddry (Swing, Blues, Tango)

  • Lessa Lamb (Swing, Blues, Tango)

  • Drea Lusion (Contemporary, Composition)

  • Justin Riley (Blues, Fusion)

  • Mark Haim (Contemporary, Composition)

  • Jürg Koch (Contemporary)

  • Amy O’Neal (Hip Hop)

  • Hannah Wiley (Ballet)

  • Cathy Madden (Alexander technique)

  • Peter Kyle (Contemporary)

  • Robin Hunt and Steve Pearson (Suzuki technique)

  • Sofiah Thom (Danyasa and Vinyasa yoga)

  • Larry Thrane (Yoga)

  • Shawn Roop (Tantra)

  • Brenda Russell (Blues)

  • Jonathan Janis (Franklin method, somatic philosophy)

  • Dennis Naumann (European Ballroom)

 

CREDENTIALS AND HONORS

– BA in Drama and Dance, University of Washington

– Certified Danyasa Inspired Yoga Instructor

– Awake At Work Certified Mindfulness Facilitator

– HeartMath Trauma-Sensitive trained practicioner

– Certified Attunement Therapy practicioner

– Do Good Things with Power program graduate with Zahava Gris

– Author in the published work, “Reinhabiting the Village”

– TEDx speaker, “Pioneering the New Renaissance through Movement”, TEDxBend

– Pacific Performance Project (P3), Intensive Training Graduate

– Actors Theater of Louisville Apprentice Program, 2003-2004

– Featured Presenter: Abundant Leadership Retreats, Body Intelligence Summit with Gay and Katie Hendricks, Conscious Dancer Podcast, Beloved Festival (4 years), Oregon Country Fair (5 years), Convergence 2018 at Arcosanti