Individual Network sessions
Live Well & Dance with Parkinson's Network session (11:15 - 12:30 UTC +1)
The Live Well & Dance with Parkinson’s Network session will continue the theme of nurture, care and creation in Practitioner Wellbeing with an expertly led practical session by Dr. Melanie Brierley.
Melanie's session will explore what it means to nurture, care, and create for ourselves as dance practitioner’s experience of working with the Parkinson's community. Why is it important to do this, and how do we approach our journey of self-care?
In this presentation, the nature and challenges of facilitating dance/movement with people with Parkinson's will be discussed and through practice, we will explore a somatic, self-sensing, self-caring, and reflective perspective as support to practitioner wellbeing. Additionally, we will examine the role of collective engagement in promoting wellness for dance artists.
Based in the Northwest UK, Dr Melanie Brierley (Mel) is a dance and health artist and registered somatic movement educator (ISMETA) advocating for the benefits of movement and dance to health and wellbeing. Through a process of artful caring, Mel facilitates somatically informed movement and dance practice to support the physical, cognitive, emotional, social, and spiritual needs of each person.
Mel offers specialist Connect & Flow movement/dance sessions and one-to-one Home Performance practice for the Parkinson’s community. She facilitates group and one-to-one movement/dance practice with people living with other neurological conditions such as Dementia, Multiple Sclerosis, MSA, Limb-Girdle Muscular Dystrophy, and Stroke.
Mel delivers professional training and mentoring for the Parkinson's community in dance and movement both nationally and internationally.
REACH! Network (for dance artists of global majority heritage/who experience racism) session (11:15 - 12:30 UTC +1)
The REACH! Network online session will create a warm and gentle atmosphere which into moments of and spaces for reflection and recovery led by Andrea Queens.
Following an introduction as to how she has arrived at her current cross-artform work, you will be guided in creating a response to reflective moments and spaces, your own journey and experiences through your choice of music. Using dance, poetry, drawing or collage you will have an opportunity to go deeper into your usual practice or refresh your perspective by trying something new in the safety of your own private space. A perfect artistic release for healing, gratitude, and overall wellness.
Andrea will then be joined in the space and for a short discussion by Gerrard Martin, fellow founding member of the Pathways Collective. Pathways is a small collective of mature artists of African Diasporic Heritage, who are growing a straightforward yet effective approach to artistic respite and mutual professional support, a ‘creative spa’. The benefits of this so far have rapidly cascaded into their individual work, the academic study of ‘creative health’ and nurture of the next generations of early and mid-career Black artists.
Pathways Collective has been supported by Curve Theatre and De Montfort University.
Early Years Dance Network session (11:15 - 12:30 UTC +1)
In this Early Years Dance Network session Peppy Hills will share how her work with refugee families from Syria has informed her practice.
This session will be a mix of discussion, presentation and practical creative exercises that will help us to think about what we need as artists and organisations when we work with refugee communities.
Coming from the perspective of therapeutic practices, we will be looking at how we can create a meaningful experience for refugee families with very young children, recognising that playful, inclusive and creative approaches are applicable to lots of children who, in experiencing Covid lockdowns, have potentially experienced developmental trauma themselves. We will be exploring the transferable principles from Peppy's therapeutic work and delving into skills and knowledge that centre on care for others and ourselves.
Inclusion in Dance Network (formerly 11 Million Reasons to Dance Network) session (11:15 - 12:30 UTC +1)
Wellbeing and access for disabled dance artists and practitioners: how are we caring, meeting needs and nurturing ourselves?
In this Inclusion in Dance Network session, we have partnered up with Stopgap Dance Company. They will deliver and join us for this discussion-based session which aims to unravel and explore how disabled artists and practitioners ensure that their own needs and individual wellbeing is priority to ensure that their practice can meet the needs of others.
This event is a discussion panel followed by questions from participants. The panel includes Laura Jones - Artistic Director at Stopgap Dance Company, Suzi Birchwood - Freelance Dance Artist, Laura Guthrie - Artist Development Manager at Graeae Theatre Company. The event will be hosted by Louise Wildish, Head of Inclusion at People Dancing.
Image credits from the top: (1) Alice.Elizabeth Photography; (2&3) People Dancing Summer School. Photographer: Rachel Cherry and (4) Dancer Krystal S Lowe, 11 Million Reasons to Dance: Cymru project, 2021. Photographer: Philip Hatcher-Moore.