Empathy by Neon Dance. Image by Camilla Greenwell
Neon Dance has received public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England to create an original and ambitious contemporary dance work with a unique offer to audiences.
‘Prehension Blooms’ will be a one of a kind, interactive performance experience with attendees free to roam, encountering 5 dancers and a beguiling, playful robot community. By moving, sitting, lying down and congregating the audience will influence all aspects of the performance.
“Many of us have been isolated in 2020, with Prehension Blooms we’re aiming to bring people back together. We’re designing tele-operated robots as part of the production so that remote audiences can join in, interacting with physical audience members, robots and performers”. - Adrienne Hart, Artistic Director, Neon Dance
There will be the opportunity to join Neon Dance and help co-create the ‘swarm’ robots for the production during a series of workshops which will take place across the UK. Keep an eye on the company website and sign up to our mailing list to be the first to find out how to take part.
Phil Gibby, Area Director, South West, Arts Council England, said:
“We are delighted to award Neon Dance £86,000 for Prehension Blooms Creation, Community Engagement and Company Development through our National Lottery Project Grants funding programme. This significant investment will allow Neon Dance to reach new audiences, specifically older people and young people, to help combat loneliness. Prehension Blooms is an original and ambitious project that will give audiences a unique experience, combining dance with robotics. Arts Council believe in creating new opportunities for every person in England to get creative and enjoy brilliant culture, which is why we’re so pleased to support this project from Neon Dance”.
Created in partnership with an award winning international team including the visual artist Ana Rajcevic, choreographer Adrienne Hart, composer Sebastian Reynolds and technologist Hemma Philamore, Prehension Blooms is set to premiere in Autumn 2021.
Alongside Arts Council England, Prehension Blooms has been commissioned by South East Dance and supported by TORCH (The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities) at the University of Oxford, South West Creative Technology Network and Studio Wayne McGregor through the QuestLab Network programme.