Our vision is to transform who gets to make and experience contemporary dance.
Our mission is to break-down barriers and perceptions of who can dance, who can make it and who can enjoy it, how dance is made and where it happens, and why that matters. Dance has the power to be transformative, from a single moment to a lifetime, and creating those moments is key to making sure that everyone no matter their background has the opportunity to experience that.
We aim to make transformative contemporary dance experiences by breaking conventions of how dance is made and experienced, where it is shown and by whom. After many challenging years for dance and the cultural sector across Wales, with major projects and opportunities dramatically being reduced or cut and impacted by the pandemic and Brexit, our aim is to play a significant part in rebuilding a culture life in Wales where people and dance artists who have been locked out of opportunities are the centre of how dance is made, shared and experienced.
We aim to reimagine the creative processes, methods and approaches for how contemporary dance productions, youth dance projects and international collaboration/touring projects are made. Through collaboration with artists, participants and communities we will build trust, ignite curiosity and create a feeling that “it is for me”. We aim to support dance artists and young dancers who are under-served by contemporary dance structures such as those who are d/Deaf/Hard of Hearing or rurally isolated in Wales to discover, develop and flourish.
We aim to produce regular productions and projects to re-build audiences and participants following the pandemic and increase impact with d/Deaf and Disabled audiences, participants and dance artists.
We work with and support a range of hearing and Deaf freelance staff, dancers, producers, teachers, creatives and technical staff who all strive to make the greatest impact on dance in Wales collectively.
Over the past nine years since our inception, we have continuously and tenaciously strived to make dance happen in Wales, whether that's through our mid-scale productions that tour nationally and internationally, in rural and main urban areas and in non-traditional and arts venues alike through to our innovative youth dance programme for young people who are Deaf and/or rurally isolated, as well as regularly participating in large scale international collaborative projects.
Our youth dance project Quiet Beats, for young Deaf people in South Wales, encapsulates our creative approach which always begins with the audience and community. What started with a one hour online workshop with just two participants at the start of the pandemic became a week of in-person workshops for 10 young people in 2022, and from September 2023 will be a regular monthly workshop programme that will climate in a performance project in Summer 2024. In addition, Jones Bach, our youth project for young people in Mid Wales began in 2014 as an aural summer school and which over the next year will develop into a creative youth dance company that is a unique offer that will support community, enable confidence and develop aspiration.
Our main stage productions are rooted in how we meet and think about audiences. For example in our current project we will be taking dance film into rural and post-industrial communities as a travelling dance cinema where the audience can choose the journey of the work and where young local people will create and share their own short films within this professional production. The project incorporates BSL, Welsh and English and features Deaf and hearing dancers, as in all our main productions. Deaf dancers will always be an integral part of our projects so that they will inspire the first generation of Welsh Deaf dancers who come through our Quiet Beats workshops.
Seeking new trustees with a passion for dance and young people especially those who are Deaf or rurally isolated, and those who have the drive to...
