Carrie Owerko
Intermediate Junior III 

Carrie Owerko has studied yoga since 1991, taught Iyengar Yoga since 1996, and studied twice for extended periods with the Iyengar family in India, where she’ll return in 2008. Her primary teachers are Mary Dunn and Patricia Walden.

Spectators at the Yogathon saw Carrie express her devotion to B. K. S. Iyengar and the Institute as she performed 230 repetitions of Viparita Chakrasana, continuous flowing backbends. She is a performer in and co-choreographer of the yoga demonstration that is being given in conjunction with Guruji’s appearance in New York and at the Yoga Journal conference in Colorado.

“Yoga is also an art form,” she says. “To share it with others is  inspiring and fulfilling.”

Carrie earned a Certified Movement Analyst degree from the Laban Institute after in-depth study of the human body and its means of expression: “That is the lens I use to analyze everything else.” She has performed professionally in theater and dance, and taught movement and theater to groups including young children and incarcerated women.

The philosophy of yoga is central to Carrie’s teaching and practice. Without that, "We're just doing something technical with the  body. Yoga in the larger context is what transforms us, cultivating that wholeness that is always within.”

Dmitri Shapira
Introductory 

Dmitri has been practicing Iyengar Yoga for nearly fifteen years. Initially drawn to Yoga for its physical benefits and for the relief of back pain, he soon realized Yoga's ability to use the body as a tool to train the mind. Also a musician with a Master's Degree from New England Conservatory of Music, Dmitri has and continues to find parallels between his two pursuits. He strives to approach both with a balance between practice and a turning away from the familiar.

For Dmitri, Yoga happens when an asana becomes less of a series of discreet actions and more of a unified whole where the various parts are balanced and synchronized. Dmitri's teaching style is challenging yet sensitive to those with physical injuries or limitations. It is serious, yet balanced with a dry sense of humor.

Dmitri's Iyengar training began in Boston where he studied primarily with Liz Owen. Upon moving to New York, he began studying with Kevin Gardiner and Brooke Meyers. His primary teacher is Mary Dunn for whom he acts as teaching assistant and has been a student of for ten years. In the spring of 2003 Dmitri completed a two-year teacher training program at the Iyengar Yoga Institute of New York. Dmitri traveled to Pune, India, in 1998 to study with the Iyengar family, and has returned to study at the Iyengar< Institute in Pune, R.I.M.Y.I., two times since.

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