This picture was taken in 1981, the first year I began teaching at Richard Gibson’s studio in Palo Alto, California. When we returned to New York City that Fall, I never dreamed I would be starting a teaching career the following March! I kept performing until 1990!! Now, twenty five years later I have documented and copyrighted my innovative work as ‘THE CHRISTINA BERNAL METHOD’. My greatest blessing and joy has been to give dancers back their careers when their doctors told them their injuries were permanent. Interestingly, I have NEVER worked with a dancer who was severely injured through an accident like being hit by a car, or from falling downstairs, but ALL injuries were due to inaccurate work habits. I was most fortunate to work with Maggie Black for eighteen years, and the five principles of alignment she taught have been the foundation from which I developed my Method, and expanded and grew as a teacher and healer. In 1982 I began my specialty, working with injured dancers. Dr. William Hamilton was the resident doctor at New York City Ballet where my husband was a member, and he was amazed at the rapid recovery from a dancer with a third degree sprained ankle. When he found out she had started back with my class, he called Marika Molner, the physical therapist at New York City Ballet and a close associate of his, and asked that she watch my class. The next day Marika came and saw--and by the end of that week I was a part of their process in rehabilitating dancers. It was a great honor a few years later, when the FIRST Dance Medicine seminar was held in New York City, to be the only non-medical person asked to be on the panel. My Method teaches dancers HOW the body works and the ALIGNMENT that PREVENTS injuries from occurring. Dancers who have stayed with my training have remained injury free. I am now sixty one, and continue to perform my Sacred Dance throughout the world, and I have NEVER sustained an injury. I am NOT the exception, but the example. Because the Method is based on how our amazing bodies are meant to function, I am happy to say that my work has also been able to help non-dancers! Dancing is one of the most beautiful ways to express Beauty and it can be done WITHOUT injury. A dancer CAN have a wonderful long career, and retire INJURY FREE! After teaching in New York for 22 years, including a seven year association with American Ballet Theatre, we returned to the Bay area in 2002. In 2004 one of my Swedish dancers, Ola Beccau, retired and asked if he could begin a Dance Seminar in order to spread my Method. That summer 15 attended--the following year Sebastian Michanek, a soloist with the Royal Swedish Ballet, came on board and used his computer skills to create a website and launched the GOTLAND INTERNATIONAL DANCE SEMINAR, based on my work. Last year 118 dancers participated and eleven countries were represented. This year nineteen dancers from China will attend. I am so grateful to go each summer and work with the professional dancers from so many Companies, and to be reunited with so many I have trained throughout my career. Several have now been authorized to teach The Method---Renato Paroni in England, Ola Beccau in Sweden, Kathrine Smythe in Memphis Tennessee...last year we added two weeks of open classes in Stockholm!! This year, 2008, I decided to do a three week BERNAL INTENSIVE’ only in Stockholm. Dancers from all over continue to come to California to study with me privately at Ruth Fischer”s DANCENTER in Santa Cruz, California. It is truly with a GRATEFUL heart that I enter the ballet studio each day, turn on a tape and begin my barre..http://www.danceseminar.comhttp://www.danceseminar.comhttp://www.newballet.orghttp://www.newballet.orghttp://www.dancenterinfo.com/shapeimage_2_link_0shapeimage_2_link_1shapeimage_2_link_2shapeimage_2_link_3shapeimage_2_link_4
Gotland International Dance Seminar NewBalletEnsemble Dancenterinfo.comhttp://www.danceseminar.comhttp://www.danceseminar.comhttp://www.danceseminar.comhttp://www.newballet.orghttp://www.dancenterinfo.com/shapeimage_5_link_0shapeimage_5_link_1shapeimage_5_link_2shapeimage_5_link_3shapeimage_5_link_4

If you wish to contact Christina,  for her availability to teach, coach, or give a Seminar on her ‘ METHOD ‘,

please email your requests to: christinaofthedove@yahoo.com

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