“A moving and virtuoso duet”
In 2015, we organized the first edition of DanceAble, a mini festival that – ahead of the biannual Holland Dance Festival – focuses its attention on inclusive dance, the dance in which people with and without physical or mental disabilities share the stage. Right from the start, it was our dream to let go of this label of a separate event and incorporate DanceAble into our regular festival program as soon as the Dutch audience was ready. After three very successful DanceAble editions, we believe that time is now.
SYMPOSIUM, WORKSHOPS, PERFORMANCES
That’s why this year, as part of our festival program, we present a symposium about inclusive dance, various inclusive dance workshops, and two inclusive dance productions, of which the first, All Inclusive, was created by us especially for this occasion. In ‘All Inclusive’ you’ll get to know the remarkable work of the German inclusive company Un-Label and a work by the Portuguese dancer and choreographer Diana Niepce, who was paralyzed in four limbs by an accident at the height of her successful career as a professional dancer.
ENCOUNTER ON THE SUBWAY
Corona effectively put Irene van Zeeland, head of education and outreach at Holland Dance Festival and curator of All Inclusive, into contact with the German Un-Label. During a livestream of a symposium about inclusive dance, she saw a duet by the company, Gravity (and other attractions), and was moved so much that she immediately knew: I want to share this with a lot of people. Gravity (and other attractions) is a moving and at the same time utterly virtuoso duet for a deaf and a hearing dancer, Tiki and Lolo, who meet on the subway. What’s special is that everyone can experience the duet completely, because sign language and the – very poetic and creative – audio description in English were included in the dance story right from the start of the creative process. And not as an addition to make the production accessible, as is usually the case, but as an essential and invaluable part of the performance.
PHYSICAL DUET
In addition, the choreography Dueto by Diana Niepce will be shown during All Inclusive. Hugo Cabral Mendes and Diana exist with the other, in a conflict that brings together love and death. A transformation, with and against the body of the other, in which the hidden violence of a subversion of roles lies. A dance that arises from the intimate distortion of the capacity of the perceived body.
