From the editor
Scilla Dyke
Subtle connections between corporeal identity and spaces of habitation resonate through animated as they continue to fascinate practitioners and artists alike. Our preoccupation with the usual, the convention-breaking, is ever prevalent in our attempt to transcend boundaries and facilitate connections between diverse 'geographical hinterlands that dancers characteristically inhabit, pitting them', as Shobana Jeyasingh muses, 'against older orthodoxies of cultural authenticity'.
Our physical bodies are constantly changing, 'never one thing, singular and stable', but as Carol Brown suggests, 'exist(ing) in flux with the activities we pursue, the spaces we inhabit, the relationships we encounter'. The touchstones - 'our skin, once the boundary of the self, and space, once the container for the body' - no longer hold, driven by our need to savour new languages.
But with this comes a tension for audiences and dancemakers who are required to make choices about how they view people or 'hybrids' that may seem alien. For it would be easy to loose sight of those things so deeply implicit in our work - 'the hugely different landscapes' as Claire Russ describes them - and 'the importance of aligning ourselves with them as members of the human race'.
Transcending frontiers remains at the fore as our discussion moves to cultural quarters, new spaces and the creation of an ecology - the keystones of our trade as Andrea Buckley calls them. The Place in London and Dance Base in Edinburgh are not only being seen as vital catalysts in the creation of cultural quarters but through inventive networking have successfully created environments where artists and communities can thrive and where tomorrow's dancers can be nurtured. For example, London Contemporary Dance School, in a radical new initiative, are working with the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and Higher Education Funding Council for England to establish a new conservatoire for dance and drama where young talented people irrespective of their background or personal circumstances, can train.
But, reminds Dick Matchett, any strategic growth whether it is a building, organisation, company, infrastructure, ecology or genre is reliant on tenacity of vision, a range of partnerships, a strong steer and deeply committed individuals. In transcending Boundaries Leon Robinson reminds that many black achievements have been air brushed out of the history books. As an activist archivist he has an insatiable appetite to illuminate and clarify chapters in British dance history such as Les Ballet Negres - Europe's first black dance company, and acknowledge the pioneers within the African and Caribbean dance community here in Britain. A sentiment echoed by Brenda Edwards who feels that promoters and producers have tended to prefer the hit and misses of 'World' dance rather then focus on celebrating British contemporary black dance, so as a country we remain isolated in this area of our dancing vernacular.
As Mike Smith puts it, many feel that the current monitoring wire is located so low that they are uncertain whether to 'hop over or limbo under'. Capturing what we do creatively in quantitative as opposed to qualitative terms in order to build an evidence base can often be at loggerheads with our practice, perhaps no more so than in the arts in health sector. Still in its infancy, however, he believes that this is the time when 'we can learn most. when the cycle of consultation, feedback and intervention becomes meaningful conversational exchange about health and can move towards intermediate indicators'. Nevertheless, trying to corroborate evidence based on the ephemeral issues and their perceived benefits raised in Animated will remain at the forefront of debate as we enter another year. Just how do we counter criticism about what is so intuitively obvious...?
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Animated: Winter 2002