History of NIM

Spring 1996 Sidsel Pape, Roy Ramberg and Måns Erlandson sat down in a bar in Oslo and discussed an idea about creating a Nordic Improvisation Meeting.
They found out that NIM would be not only a meeting, but also a milkcow feeding improvisers with ideas and projects for the future. They thought that out of NIM could NID – Nordic Impro Dancers grow, which could create a base for a Nordic Improdance Festival NIF.

Nordic Improvisation Meeting was arranged the first time in autumn 1996 at the Årsta Theatre in Stockholm initiated by Måns Erlandson. The idea was to create a network for dance improvisers, where a meeting would circulate and be passed on to different countries and organizers in Scandinavia twice a year. Since that first meeting, NIM has been arranged up to twice a year in different places in Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland.

Through these years has been created a base of nordic contact improvisers.
Some of these people have, through meeting at NIM, created projects and performances in Scandinavia with improvised dance and music.

Contact improvisation as an art form takes a more important part in performance art in Europe since 10 years. It seems like this spirit has reach also Scandinavia.
There is a tendency of bringing for example contact improvisation in to the schedule at dance schools. More jams, seminars and workshops are organized, and people goes around Scandinavia taking part of that.

Each NIM draws 70-90 persons from 5-8 countries, not only from Scandinavia.
NIM has, among other arrangments, contributed to a strong nordic engagement for contact improvisation and for other jams starting up in Scandinavia.