As an art director and a graphic designer, the professional path of visual communication has led me to beautiful places of self expression.

Some projects more than others have made me realize the innate power that lies within composition and color.

But for me personally, there was always a kind of unspoken craving that lay under the surface, a secret desire to express those feelings in a performative physical way. To unleash an emotion that’s far beyond the screen.

I share this basic desire with most people I know, yet I find that in 2023 we rarely engage in physical activity that isn’t functional or otherwise constrained to a strict set of rules. Modern times offer a variety of physical outlets, but those of us that aren’t born sporty and want an activity that awakens the soul, as much as the body are supposed to choose between various types of yoga, pilates, and Qigong.

And then there’s Gaga. Gaga is not so much a class or a lesson as it is an invitation for physical expression, a world movement made of people inclined to let movement into their lives and to explore the personal body as a dynamic power.

Its terminology and many expressions strike a chord with spiritual growth, without bringing in religious or New Age ideologies. Each session is an improvisation of the mind and body that takes you on a different path, and each instructor practices his or hers own dialect of the Gaga, presenting it in a different light.

Take “Far Away Engines” for example. “Far Away Engines” is a term used to enhance the ignition of the root of a movement, understanding that when we move our arm, that movement can begin somewhere far from it in the body. Our shoulder blade is able to ignite it and define that movement of the arm, and make it stretch even further.

During one of my Gaga sessions I met Béatrice Larrivée, a former dancer in the Young Ensemble of Batsheva Dance Company, a choreographer and a Gaga instructor. I was immediately captured by her persona. I couldn’t take my eyes off of her when seeing her perform in her own show “She looks like she’d be an animal in bed” in the CCA: Tel Aviv, together with the dancer Alma Karvat Shemesh.

I wanted to document the way she moves and ask her about each movement and what it means to her. Together with the photographer Meidan Gil Harush, we made this study of Béatrice and how she moves, focusing on seven of the many terms you can find in the Gaga vocabulary. Each term is a window through which to expand the knowledge of this language and discover how it can effect every one of us.