Youth dance

News from Dance Integrated Australia

Creative Director of Dance Integrated Australia talks about Corner Dance Lab and New Works Forum in Hong Kong, which will explore ways of producing inclusive performances for artists with diverse backgrounds and physical abilities.

AYDF 2012 video diary

If you’ve ever wondered what happens each day of the festival, this video diary from the last AYDF gives you a taste of the festival experience. How does it feel to perform in a professional theatre before your peers? What type of dance will we make with the choreographic mentors? What are the other dancers like? What will I learn? What is site-specific performance? What is it like being a choreographic mentor? Young dancers and their choreographic mentors answer these questions and more.

Festival participants and choreographic mentors discuss movement, meaning, collaboration and site-specific performance.

Foreshore dancing at the 2009 AYDF

It's standard Aussie holiday fare—families line the grassy foreshore, and picnics, cricket games and shrieking children abound. However, there are a few surprises in store along the foreshore on this particular Saturday. Scattered along the promenade are tents, caravans and campervans from a variety of eras, and 160 young dancers who dance in and around these temporary homes. This is Foreshore Cruisin', the performance that is the culmination of the 2009 Australian Youth Dance Festival (AYDF).

Erin-Louise Nash’s 2006 AYDF diary

As soon as the lights and music started, I had this amazing feeling rush over me. It was then that I really knew that I was a part of something huge! Here I was, hours away from home, performing in a new town, right next to dancers from all over the country! Not only that, but I was dancing beside people from all different dance backgrounds and skill levels.

Both performances went so well that it was hard to believe we’d only choreographed the pieces a few days earlier. The show looked like we had been rehearsing together for months!

Nubrico Youth Dance at the 2006 Australian Youth Dance Festival

Tracey Brown and Sharon Teear, youth dance leaders from UK's Rubicon Dance, discuss their time at the 2006 Australian Youth Dance Festival with their youth dance group Nubrico.

The festival was great in exploring, sharing and learning different dance styles as well as sharing our passion for dance. Having the chance to go to Australia has been a fantastic experience for me and one that I will never forget! – Sophie

Diedre Atkinson’s 2006 Australian Youth Dance Festival experience

Diedre Atkinson, a teacher at John Curtain College of the Arts, accompanied her students to several Australian Youth Dance Festivals. She described the AYDF as "an irreplaceable experience in the students’ development and discovery of dance. Total immersion in dance through participation in workshops, choreographic process, observation, performances, reflection and evaluation results in an intensive learning experience, and opens eyes wide to so many more possibilities".

Samara Cunningham’s 2004 AYDF experience

When Samara Cunningham attended the 2004 AYDF she was a Perth-based independent artist. Samara graduated from WAAPA with a Bachelor of Arts (Dance) in 1998. In this article she shares her experience of the Festival's choreographic development process and performance outcome.

Tara Gower’s 2004 AYDF experience

Tara Gower was an 18-year-old first year student at QUT Dance in Brisbane when she attended the 2004 Australian Youth Dance Festival (AYDF). She is now a member of Bangarra Dance Company. Here she shares her experience of the 2004 AYDF.

‘Dance, young people and change’ summit program

Dance, Young People and Change brought together young people, parents, educators and others from around the world to share and consider the role of dance in young people’s lives. It provided critical evaluation and reflection on approaches to dance learning, teaching and curriculum for young people and offered opportunities to critique the relevance of dance for young people within education and community contexts.

Quantum leaping

Shona Erskine interviews Mark Gordon, director of the Australian Choreographic Centre, and Ruth Osborne, artistic director of the Quantum Leap Youth Choreographic Ensemble in Canberra. This discussion of the program, indicates how this kind of project can have a direct influence on the community and the public perception of dance.

The body observes

The key message of the paper is that while observing a person moving, somatic and sensory processes are elicited and these have an impact on both the observer and the mover. The recognition of these processes is important to assessment, observation and clinical therapy protocols. The paper describes embodied awareness, including methods used in Authentic Movement, Dance, Dance/Movement Therapy, Body Psychotherapy, Body-Mind Centring, Sensory Awareness and Jungian Analysis. Arts-based practices can inform clinical practices, and embodied interaction in clinical practice can also inspire artistic research. The methodology of kinaesthetic attunement weaves subjective and objective experiences and can inform clinical relationships, childcare and educational practices.

Performance: meanings and connections in dance experiences for young people of all ages

In this paper Ann Kipling Brown presents an overview of the association and the place of performance at the triennial conferences. Following this discussion, three other daCi members, Kathy Vlassopoulos, Karen Bond and Jeff Meiners, whose work focuses on dance for young people, describe specific events and experiences they have created that reflect the aims of the association.

Firstly, Kathy Vlassopoulos describes the Children’s Dance Festival, held annually in Melbourne, Australia. The festival was initiated in1996 and creates a site-specific event that provides the opportunity for children to experience dance through a collaborative process with professional artists.

Secondly, Karen Bond gives an account of daCi’s 2nd Intergenerational Gathering, titled Out of many, we are One. Over an intensive three-day period, participants explored a progression of dancing and performing related to themes of self, community, and the future.

And thirdly, Jeff Meiners focuses on the creation of work for young children, spanning the years from birth to eight, and explores the nature of the work being created and the responses of the young children as active audience members.