This article aims to reflect on the concept of bodily states in dance through artistic and academic investigations of corporeality and dance in the traditional Pernambuco cultural performance Cavalo Marinho. By analysing the artistic investigation process, encompassing field research in the context of this cultural expression, we aim to conduct a dialogue with theoretical approaches to gesture and perception. Thus, concepts of pre-movement and tonic states have significant value in understanding a creative process based on the relationship between perception, memory, imagination, states, and movements.