Alona Peretz (1963) has been teaching expression and improvisation for the last 13 years in various work frames.
Alona began her way by studying acting at Nissan Nativ Acting Studio (1986-1989). After graduating and taking part in various theater and television productions, Alona left Israel and continued her studies with Ruth Zapora, founder of Action Theater – The Improvisation of Presence method, in Berkley, California. In 1991, as a member of The Big Big Impro troupe she performed in San-Francisco and the surrounding area, and in 1992, long training under the guidance of her teacher Ruth Zapora, she returned to Haifa, Israel.
Since her return to Israel, Alona has been teaching the fundamentals of "Action Theater" and has continued to explore and develop with her students the roots of the creative process – improvisation, spontaneous expression and intimacy in new forms of togetherness and relationships.
As a lecturer on improvisation in Lesley College (1994-2001), in the Psychodrama and drama therapy Track, Alona was faced with the various articulations concerning the connection between improvisation, therapy and art; especially the connection between improvising as the foundation for any creative process and a pre-condition or human edification and dialogue that is genuinely healing. At that time Alona began to incorporate improvisation and expression methods into Gestalt Therapy. Of great importance was for her the revelation that that the ability to respond out of and in any situation is also a possible, learned skill.
Since 1997 Alona has been a member of the Israeli Gestalt Institute, specializing in body processes. She began to articulate with her students the synthesis between the two so that creativity, self-creation and healing became different parts and aspects of a unified dialogical process.

Following her work with student-actor groups as a teacher in Nissan Nativ Acting Studio (1993), Alona moved to Tel Aviv. She continued to explore and discover the art of the moment – improvisation – as the basis for the actor's work. The ability to sustain the moment, to express it and create from within it, to acknowledge the un-certainty and to control the lack of control – all of these have been and remain Alona's endless field of investigation. At the Nissan Nativ Acting Studio, Alona teaches the Prep. class, as well as the second and third year classes.
During the years of teaching and learning, Alona has come across many youths (Matan 1994-2002, Wizo Arts High-School in Haifa, etc.), and from them she learned the importance of alternative strategies of listening to oneself each moment anew. The listening to the inner world of the "self" is of vital importance in the way of becoming a responsible, active and re-active human. For youths, who often get lost in alienated and oppressive arenas, discovering that they can respond from within their inner world has been encouraging, empowering, and edifying.
The art of improvisation might become a starting point in any given moment. It took Alona many years to find the ways for working and creating with artists from other disciplines. It became a fascinating experience. These experiences enabled interesting one-of-a-kind creative encounters.

The encounter with artist and composer Keren Rosenbaum, enabled the New Voices festival in Kfar Blum (1998), The Ultra-Sound festival (Tmunaa Theatre 1999-2000), the shows Red Newspaper & Cello (TLV club, 2002), Without ("Habama", Jerusalem 2001), A moment in here (Shelter 209, 2000). Keren Rosenbaum is also the founder of the Reflex Ensemble – an inter-disciplinary ensemble in which Alona takes part as a creator in movement, sound and text, initiator and improviser. She performed with Reflex in the "Center for Performing Arts" (Tel-Aviv), "Zionists of America" house, "Tmunaa" theater, the Tel-Aviv museum and many more. The Reflex ensemble will perform, again, in New-York at the Chelsea art museum in March 2005.
The attraction about the possibility of combining the improvisational with the structural, created the opportunity to appear in theater, and Alona played as Bracha Rozen in the play "Bracha Rozen", written and directed by Rachel Shor, Akko festival (1999).
Despite her rich experience as an actor and performer, Alona spends most of her time teaching improvisation. She defines herself as an improviser. Despite the huge satisfaction gained from the un-known, Alona decided in 1998 to explore her ability to join an academic framework and from within it develop the process of improvisation. She took up studies in Leads University and got her Master's Degree in Arts and Education, with a thesis on "The Attitudes of Teachers in the Israeli Education System – Toward the Concept of Improvisation in Teaching". Since improvisation is the basis for any creative process and education is supposed to be a creative dialogue, Alona was interested in the educator's path in an improvisational context. The conclusion of her study about improvisation in teaching show that Israeli teachers are aware of their use of improvisation although they are very rarely in the state of articulating the relation between improvisation and teaching in actuality. They improvise out of a "lack", out of anguish, instead of courage, abundance, richness and creative happiness.
Since improvising is also a learned ability, Alona sees herself committed to train teachers and enhance their dialogical ability to create and give meaning to space and time with their partners – the students. Alona has been guiding teachers and principles in various surroundings (Seminar Hakibutzim College, Zipori center, Hakfar Hayarok College). In 2002, returning to Haifa, Alona received a gift from Esti Rozeman (of the JOINT and Omanut La'am): to establish a Women's Multicultural Theater and work with women from a multi-cultural background in Haifa's poorest east neighborhoods. The unique encounter with these women gave birth to the show "Kalot Haim" and empowered them by making these women's "voice" audible, visible, creative and respectable. Improvisation has become a vessel for dialogue between differences. Improvisation as an art created unique opportunities for discussion and understanding between these women.
The chance to work with dancers and artists was granted to Alona by Liat and Ruvik, of the Jaffa group, where she taught improvisation under the guise of "Theater" (2002-2004).
Today Alona continues to teach the art of improvisation and expression to diverse groups. The Center for Improvisation was opened this year as a response to a call to establish a home for a community of all Israeli improvisers, meeting in the same space, and at the same time – and "making love".
The center's becoming a vibrant, dynamic, intimate, relevant, authentic, communicative place is a joyous event.
Each and every one has the ability to create. To create from moment to moment him/her-self, his/her life, the meanings waiting to reveal themselves, the joy of personal and shared creation.

Improvcenter; the art of improvisation and expression - Alona Peretz, aims at and offers itself to anyone interested in exploring and creating from within himself or herself in the ever-changing presence.