Making Connections is a monthly free drop in event for Swindon and Southwest creatives that offers a held space for arts professionals and community artists to be together. Each session will have a practical component (2-hour workshop led by a guest artist), which will be followed by a networking/informal meet facilitated by the Making Connections team. The Making Connections team are Adrienne Hart (Artistic Director, Neon Dance) and Sarah Ferris (Swindon based dance artist and teacher).
“Adrienne and I spoke about a desire for a space to improvise, be creative with others, to bring regional based creatives together for personal and professional development, to feel embedded within a community and to be inspired.”
Where: Swindon Dance
When: Fourth Friday of the month 1.30pm - 4.30pm January to March 2025. See our Neon Dance Events page for more details.
Confirmed guest facilitators include: Theo Clinkard, Seke Chimutengwende and Marie-Louise Flexen.
In this session, Marie-Louise Flexen will lead a 2-hour improvisation workshop focused on movement and text and this will be followed by a networking/informal meet facilitated by the Making Connections team.
Dance Improvisation into Instant Composition: “Finding pathways into dance movement using the starting point of the Fibonacci sequence in nature. We will create improvisations and instant compositions that weave dance, movement and creative ideas together, resulting in a co-creation and shared experience.”
We will:
complete inclusive movement and dance tasks to guide you into an embodied experience that enables expressive, authentic physical vocabulary.
Guide you through individual and group creativity and collaboration. Provide a shared sensory experience that is unique to the afternoons group by connecting with each other through dance, movement and creative ideas.
Provide a safe platform for shared experience, dancing and moving in a range of solo, group dances and gentle contact improvisations.
About Marie-Louise: Marie-Louise Flexen is an experienced dance artist, versatile performer, choreographer and movement director with 30 years experience. She has worked with renowned dance makers and theatre directors since graduating from the London School of Contemporary Dance. Over the past 20 years she has produced, created, and directed numerous Arts Council funded and commissioned performances, which have included large-scale site- specific works, touring dance theatre, dance films, combined arts collaborations, outdoors arts, street theatre, participatory dance, cabaret and performance for influential musicians. Previously Marie-Louise was a company member of Seven Sisters Group, London and El Paller, Catalunya. After moving to Gloucestershire she also became a dancer with rhythm tap company Sole Rebel and Swerve Dance Theatre. Marie-Louise won 2015 Inspiring Leader, One Dance UK award. She was a finalist in The Place Prize 2005 and was nominated for a Total Theatre Award 2007. marielouiseflexen.com
NB: we appreciate that it can be challenging to find a spare three hours each month and would therefore welcome anyone who can commit to the workshop but not the networking (or vice versa). It is our intention to work with and curate an offer for local creatives and we hope to grow and adapt this initiative with those who take part.
Please complete the form to register.
Be sure to let us know which Making Connections session/s you wish to attend.