People Dancing

From the editor

In this issue of Animated we wanted to reveal some of the powerful and inspiring work that community dance artists are doing to contribute to health and wellbeing. It has long been our contention that active participation in high quality dance experiences contributes positively to the wellbeing of individuals and communities, not simply as an exercise and fitness regime but as something deeper and more substantial. Several of the articles in this issue are testament to this. Increasingly we are finding that a range of dance experiences are contributing to supporting people to manage better their clinical conditions such as Parkinson’s disease and dementia; person centred approaches pioneered by community dance artists are clearly of importance here.

We are also delighted to feature two articles that look at the kinds of impacts small projects had that were part of Big Dance. And finally to feature a report on the Barrowlands project in Glasgow led by Michael Clark’s company in partnership with Dance House which begins with Michael’s assertion “everyone can dance, everyone does dance” – a great way to start the year.

Ken Bartlett, Creative Director, Foundation for Community Dance