Apply to be a Part of This Year's Our City Dances Programme

We are looking for artists to present five performances, events and workshops to help bring our 2021 Our City Dances festival to the people of Brighton & Hove.

Gabe from Streetfunk, Our City Dances 2018. Photo Zoe Manders

This year, due to COVID regulations, the festival will be running for a week from Monday 19 July, featuring mainly online activity and some COVID-safe outdoor performances that will be filmed and presented on our website. The emphasis of our physical programme will be on taking activity to two of our local partners Puffin Nursery and Brooke Mead Extra Care Housing for People Living with Dementia. 

We are looking for a broad range of work to ensure we have a diverse programme of activity. We are keen that the work challenges perceptions of what dance looks like, and is inclusive, diverse, and dynamic.

Our City Dances is a free annual celebration of dance in Brighton & Hove, created in collaboration with our wonderful Community Steering Group. It forms an integral part of The Welcome Project, a programme of activities and events which has been running for the past three years, designed to encourage more people to have a go at dance in the run up to the launch of The Dance Space.

We first presented the festival in July 2018 and it went down a storm, with nearly 1600 people enjoying dance performances, workshops, discussions and installations across Brighton over two days. For its second outing in June 2019 - the last time that large groups of people were able to enjoy our outdoor programme in all its pre-COVID glory – we saw a 59% increase in audience figures from the previous year. Sadly, there was no Our City Dances in 2020, but this summer we are delighted that it will be making a return, albeit in a slightly different way.

Throughout the pandemic The Welcome Project team have been working hard to stay connected with the people we work with in the local community, particularly those most vulnerable. This year’s Our City Dances is a continuation of this work, finding safe but fun ways to maintain relationships and offer both creative and practical support. Outside of this targeted outdoor activity, there will be performances and workshops for people of all ages to enjoy on the South East Dance website.
 

For full details on what we are looking for and how to apply, visit the Our City Dances call-out page.