News

The Place is pleased to announce that once again independent dance artists will take up their Choreodrome Research Residencies 2021 in the studios this summer. The Place has increased its financial offer for artists this year and thanks to additional money from DCMS and the Cultural Recovery Fund, the commission for each individual Choreodrome artist has doubled, allowing for more time, planning and evaluation for a richer period of research.

Choreodrome, part of The Place’s range of development opportunities designed to nurture talent and facilitate the growth of independent artists’ creativity and businesses, is one of the most important programmes we offer to support artists’ careers. In 2020, Choreodrome artists faced challenging circumstances, with limited studio capacity or working on their projects entirely online. This year’s Choreodrome artists will benefit from all the learning of the last 12 months around online sharings, options for remote working and increased flexibility in scheduling for artists, whilst also allowing us to bring back some of the things we were unable to do last year such as the lunchtime get-togethers and the chance to have staff join artists in the studio in-person.

The Place received over 200 applications for Choreodrome 2021, inviting 25 shortlisted artists for an online discussion about their ideas and selecting the final 18 projects. The selection panel included a combination of members of The Place’s Theatre and Artist Development team and former Choreodrome bursary recipient and Work Place artist Jamaal Burkmar.

Eddie Nixon Artistic Director of The Place says about the programme, ‘Choreodrome at The Place has always been about supporting artists to let the seed of a new project grow in unexpected ways. Artists continue to face high level of uncertainty and challenge due to Coivd-19, but now more than ever, we maintain our commitment to support creative innovation. We always want to make new connections, so we’re collaborating with artists we’ve never worked with before as well as continuing our support for choreographers who have created with us in the past, who have new ideas they want to explore. I hope this will be a great few months of dance experiments.’

Choreodrome offers artists:

• Studio Residencies of two weeks
• Commissions of £2000
• Technical equipment to support studio work (cameras, projectors, sound equipment)
• Studio sharings and feedback sessions online
• Weekly online get-togethers with other artists to network and share ideas

The artists who are part of this year’s Choreodrome Research Residencies are:

Akshay Sharma, Alicia Meehan, Carolyn Bolton, Charlotte Mclean, Clara Bajado, Dani Harris-Walters, George Fellows/ Four Hands, Georgia Tegou and Kristina Pulejkova, Jasmine Chui, Jo Bannon, Laura Dajao, Lewys Holt, Ruby Portus, Sara Green, Shivaangee Agrawal, Si Rawlinson, Temitope Ajose Cutting, Yolanda Mercy

Clara Bajado and Dani Harris-Walters are awarded additional support from Artists 4 Artists, who are each year supporting Choreodrome artists whose practices have roots in hip hop.

Lee Griffith, Artists 4 Artists Co-Director says: “We are really excited to be supporting Clara Bajado and Dani Harris-Walters through the Choreodrome partnership with The Place. This is a unique relationship, where a leading dance organisation is working with a grassroots community organisation to offer a bespoke package of support combining both organisation’s skills, experiences and resources – we certainly need more of this to support underserved communities and artforms.”

More information about the artists at The Place can be found here: https://www.theplace.org.uk/choreodrome-2020-artists