DanceAble - internationaal symposium inclusiedans

Op zaterdag 28 november 2015 organiseerden Dēmos en Danspunt collectief vervoer naar DanceAble, een internationaal symposium rond inclusiedans van Holland Dance in Den Haag. Tal van innovatieve projecten, werkwijzen en best practices rondom inclusiedans kwamen er aan bod. DanceAble wilde de bewustwording rond inclusiedans en de empowerment van dansers met een beperking een impuls geven. Het DanceAble symposium was een organisatie van Holland Dance in samenwerking met het Landelijk Kennisinstituut Cultuureducatie en Amateurkunst (LKCA).

Demos-medewerker Kris De Visscher mocht als dagvoorzitter het geheel aan elkaar praten. Zijn voorbereiding (in het Engels weliswaar) geeft je een overzicht van de dag. Meer gedetailleerde informatie vind je via de link onderaan. 

10:00 – 10:05 
Welcome 

Goodmorning everyone. My name is Kris and on behalf of the organisers I would like to welcome you to Dance Able, the first symposium in Holland on inclusive dance practice. We welcome a wide variety of partipants from the fields of dance and education, but we also have participants in charge of policy-making and funding. We have guests from Holland and Belgium and from abroad, so we’ve chosen English as the language of communication. Please let me reassure all the non-native English speakers, your own personal version of English will do just fine. Don’t let language hold you back…

I’m honored to be your host today. Working for Demos, a Brussels based research centre, I’ve had the privilige to study inclusive arts practice in Belgium and abroad. Me hosting this conference is a fine example of the growing cooperation between Holland and Belgium on this subject. As were are facing the same challenges, this cooperation is vital for us both.

The main aim of the conference is to send you home deeply inspired by the powerful practice and opinions presented here today. The organisers strongly hope that this conference will be the beginning of an ongoing proces of including disabled artists in the world of (contemporary) dance. 

Before we begin, I would like to point out that if you need any support today to fully participate in this conference, feel free to adress the people with the red badge. 

10:05 – 10:10
Welkomstspeech door de initiatiefnemers van het symposium

Martine Van Dijck (Holland Dance) en Wies Rosenboom (LKCA).
And now, we would like to start off with a warm welcome from the organisers of the symposium: Martine Van Dijck for Holland Dance and Wies Rosenboom for the National Centre of Expertise for Cultural Education and Amateur Arts, followed by a videomessage by Jetta Klijnsma, State Secretary for Social Affairs and Employment who expresses her appreciation for this conference

10:10 – 10:15
Videoboodschap Jetta Klijnsma.

10:15 – 10:20
Duet

Next, the conference proudly presents the first of two mixed doubles duets, commissioned by Holland Dance. The second duet will be presented later today. When Adam Benjamin, on of the founders of Candoco dance company in the UK, was asked how inclusive dance can be promoted, he answered: create work of high quality and let it speak for itself. And that was exactly the goal of Holland Dance in commissioning these duets, to put the artistic aims up front and to show that participation and excellence can go hand in hand. In the first mixed doubles duet we see dancers Nele Deckx and Sonja Parmentier in a choreography by Fang-Yu Shen, choreographer of the Scapino Ballet Rotterdam.

10:30 – 10:55
Key-Note Janice Parker

Janice Parker is an award winning independent choreographer and dance-maker. Based in Edinburgh, Scotland and working national and internationally, Janice works with people of all ages and abilities often mixing the community and the professional dance worlds. Much of her current work is in collaboration with disabled performers. Janice will talk directly from her 30 years of experience. Sharing her perspective, her knowledge, her passion and her beliefs, she will ask us to consider our expectations about who has the right to dance and what dance can be. She will reflect on the ways we understand ‘participation’ and ‘professonal’ and she will focus on the importance of inclusive, disablity-led work and on what diversity contributes to art and society. Finally, Janice will look at what we can do to make a start and make things happen and what we need to consider in order to create a real change for disabled pleople and dance.

10:55 – 11:00
Naar de keuzesessies

And now it’s time for our first round of workshops. You can find your workshop on your badge. We’ve managed to acknowledge everyone’s first or second choice and still keep the groups small enough for real interaction. The presentation of De Gedenkende will take place in the Korzo Studio on the ground floor. Also on the ground floor, in Club Korzo, is Marc Vlemmix’ talk on Dance for Health. Upstairs, in the Nobelstudio, you can find the dubble bill De onzichtbare danser by Eline Van Ark and Ervaren/leren/delen by Jan van den Hout. Opposite to the Nobelstudio you can join the Responsive Dance Teaching Practice bij Stopgap Dance company in the Kerkstudio.

11:15 – 12:45
Keuzesessies

12:45 – 13:30
Lunch

13:30 – 13:15
Introdans

Nice to see all of you back after the break. We couldn’t organise a conference on inclusive dance in the Netherlands without including the Dutch inclusive dance pioneers of Introdans. Every two years, Introdans’ choreographer and artistic manager of Introdans Interactie Adriaan Luteijn creates a performance with the professional dancers of his company and guestdancers with a different dance vocabulary. The last ‘encouter’ was created in 2014. In Invisibly Visible the dancers of Introdance share the stage with dancers with an almost invisual impairement. Today we see an extract from this performance, the so- called AspergerDuet, performed by Jamy Schinkelshoek and Stefan van Ommeren.

13:20 – 14:00
Key-note Lucy Bennett

For anyone interested in inclusive dance practice, it’s apparent that the United Kingdom is currently leading the way. Holland Dance was very glad to engage Lucy Bennett, artistic director of STOPGAP dance company, to coach the choreographers of the commissioned work and to offer her skills and experience to this symposium. Immersed in Stopgap’s work since 2003, Lucy has learnt to blend and expand the dynamic interaction of distinctly different dancers. Working as a choreographer within a company of diverse dancers has allowed Lucy to develop, define and encapsulate her love for expressing human stories through dance. In her keynote speech, Lucy will focus on why STOPGAP dance company embraces diversity and how it feeds their artistic identity. She will also highlight aspects of the company’s studio practice such as: reinvention, revelation and integration. Ladies and gentlemen…

14:00 – 14:15
Duet

Now it’s time for the second mixed doubles duet, commissioned by Holland Dance and performed by Geneviève van Quaquebeke and Marie Limet in a choreography by Min Hee Bervoets.

14:15 – 15:10
Panelgesprek

Joining us for the panel descussion are:

Laura Jones – dancer at STOPGAP dance company
Nienke Reehorst – artistic director of Theater Stap
Min Hee Bervoets, choreographer of one of the mixed doubles
Adriaan Luteijn, choreographer and artistic manager of Introdans Interactie

And on one the first row Iris Bouche of the Royal Conservatoire in Antwerp, Jan van den Hout (Dance and fun), Lucy Benett (StopGap) and Susane Scheider (BewegGrund) are on the edge of their seat to join in.

First topic is the relation between ‘participation’ and ‘excellence’.

Have you noticed that non-disabled dancers tend to hold back at first and focus on supporting the disabled dancers? How do you deal with this?
And the other way, that the disabled dancers get all the attention and the others have to struggle to get some attention as well?
How does a choreographer get the maximum out of all the dancers involved?
How important is the dance tecnique of the disabled dancer? Is ‘personality’ and ‘personal movement’ sufficient, or is tecnique necessary?
How do you get the most out of the unique mix of abilities?

How do you feel about the label ‘inclusive dance’? Does this ‘label’ have a function? Is it necessary to label this kind of work?

How ‘special’ is inclusive dance? Are we creating a new niche in the world of (contemporary) dance or are we touching the heart of what dance is/should be?

If it does touches the ‘heart’, how can we bring it to the centre of the dance world? Who has a responsibilty, what needs to be done?

15:10 – 15:30
Naar de keuzesessies

And now we break up again for a new round of workshops. On the ground floor, you’ll find the workshop First Encounter in the Korzo Studio and in Club Korzo there’s the dubble bill: BewegGrund and Melissa Emblin will tell you the story of ‘Project RAD’. The workshop of Theater Stap is in the Nobelstudio on the second floor, and in the Kerkstudio you can join the workshop ‘Van dromen naar daden.’ We’ll meet up here again at 17:15 to close this conference with some comments and a sparkling finale.

17:15 – 17:30
Afsluiting 

On behalf of the organisers I would thank you very much for joining us and a big thank you to all the performers, choreographers and practioners for sharing their experience and expertise.
But it isn’t over yet!

Tonight at 20:00 at Theater aan het Spui you can see the wonderful performance PitStop, created by choreographers Goele Van Dijck, Jasper Džuki Jelen & Mojra Vogelnik Škerlj and director Hildegard Draaijer. The performance is brought to you by a unique group of dancers of mixed age and ability. Different rythm’s, different tempo’s, come together on stage in a suprising mix of people, styles and abilities.

17:30 – 18:00
Ill-Abilities

Ill-Abilities are an international breakdance crew. Focussing on individual talents, every breakdancer develops a unique set of skills and moves, based on their unique abilities. Disability isn’t an issue here. But Ill-abilities did feel the need for an artistisc challenge. Holland Dance offered them the opportunity to take their skills up to a next level, with the support of choreographer and breakdance expert Lloyd Marengo. Ladies and gentlemen, let their powerful performance and their motto ‘no excuses, no limits’ inspire you: Ladies and gentlemen… Ill-Abilities!