This April, while you are happily snoring in your bed, a bunch of dancers will be taking to the streets for a nocturnal performance with a difference!
Across the world, Invisible Dances has been quietly creating a storm. So far, there have been performances in six continents. But, what is this all about? Under the cover of night, dancers take to the streets to perform to no one. As they dance, they leave behind them a series of colourful lines, drawn by chalk. A trace of where they’ve been.
This unusual, global dance event has been created by Elisabeth Schilling. Schilling is a dancer and choreographer. She was looking for a way to bring performance back into towns and cities under lockdown conditions. The colourful lines drawn by the dancers are left to inspire and guide people as they wake to find them.
Invisible Dances in Dorset
Now, dancers in the UK will be turning pavements in Dorset into a mysterious rainbow. Elisabeth Schilling’s Invisible Dances will be having its English premiere this April. And it’s all happening as part of Pavilion Dance South West’s Dancing in the Street initiative, to bring dance to your doorstep. Local artists will be performing Elisabeth Schilling’s Invisible Dances to connect with audiences in an unconventional, but safe way.
PDSW is committed to keeping their community dancing, and this inspiring work combines dance with visual art in a poetic and playful way. The performances will turn our streets and squares into stages and canvases. These performances are unannounced, taking place at night. And the colourful traces will be a nice surprise for local residents the next morning.
For the April event, a group of socially-distanced local dancers will meet in the middle of the night, in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole area. They’ll be accompanied by the same number of ‘tracers’. The dancers will start moving through the town, and behind them, the tracers will mark each pathway with chalk spray. Come morning, when everyone wakes up, they will be greeted with colourful lines dancing through the town, intertwining, looping, oscillating – a trace of an ‘invisible dance’. These traces are a public memory of a dance no-one saw, and an invitation for everyone to join the dance in the street.
When: 6th – 10th April 2021
Where: Across Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole, Dorset
£: Free
More info: www.pdsw.org.uk