Local People

Off to a fine art

Adam Benjamin didn’t start dancing until his late twenties, but has since travelled the world, creating spectacular productions. Adam grew up in London, becoming a keen sportsman and competing at a high level, until his early twenties, when his attention turned to martial arts, particularly Tai Chi. He then realised that dance offered exciting opportunities to combine art with the physical element he loved in martial arts. At 27, he auditioned to study dance at Middlesex Polytechnic; the dance technique class he admits was one of his all-time most painful experiences, however his audition piece fared better. Basing his routine around Tai Chi and Ba Gua movements he captured the tutor’s interest, winning a place in true ‘Billy Elliot’ style. Having also managed to get on the art programme, he graduated in Dance and Fine Art in 1990, and shortly afterwards secured his first art exhibition in the King’s Road. Initially he taught dance part-time in a further education college to fund his painting, but he began to enjoy the teaching, particularly staging productions with the students and developing his skills as a choreographer. Adam accepted an artist in residency position at a new integrated recreation centre attached to the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in London. Its gym was used by both disabled and nondisabled people but he noticed there

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weren’t any shared sessions, and it struck him that dance had the potential to provide a collective experience. Adam had met Celeste Dandeker through the spinal cord injury charity, ASPIRE; she had been one of the first contemporary UK dancers, but was now quadriplegic after breaking her neck during a performance. Adam persuaded her to start a weekly dance class open to anyone, and as they taught together, the project evolved into CandoCo Dance Company, the first professional company for disabled and non-disabled dancers. Art took a back seat, and Adam and Celeste spent their time overturning stereotypical beliefs about physical ability. Adam met the late David Toole at one of their first workshops, Toole later joined the company, an extraordinary performer who danced on his hands, and became one of the most celebrated disabled dancers in the world.

The company’s first public performance in Leeds was attended by a critic from The Guardian, after which the project snowballed. By 1993 the company was touring internationally and filling 900 seats in the South Bank. Although it was initially difficult to persuade the top able-bodied dancers to join, that changed as the company’s reputation grew. Adam choreographed and danced with CandoCo from 1991 to 1998, and worked with many inspirational people, including Dame Siobhan Davies, who taught him how to involve his dancers in devising choreography, making them an intrinsic part of the creative process – a life skill he has embraced ever since.

After leaving CandoCo he worked in South Africa, as artistic director of Tshwaragano Dance Company, where he provided a socially integrated platform for disabled, non-disabled, black and white dancers, and even made a soundtrack with the choir of Nelson Mandela, for his show The Querist’s Quire. Projects took him to Ethopia, Senegal and Japan often working in conjunction with the British Council, as well as spending time creating his own projects in Europe. It was in Japan during a break in a busy schedule that he met Tamami, the director of a retreat centre in Nagano, an expert in Japanese reflexology – and his future wife.

In 2002, the couple moved to Cornwall where they brought up their three boys, and in 2008 Adam took on a full-time teaching role with the faculty of theatre and performance at the University of Plymouth. Here he became the catalyst for building The House, the university’s fully accessible venue for performing arts. In 2017 he returned to freelance work, only for the pandemic to shut down the performing arts worldwide two years later. Adam used the time to write, teach Tai Chi outside, set up an environmental fundraiser for reforestation (The Dancers’ Forest) and also rediscover painting. He has barely painted since the 1990s but hasn’t lost his touch, although he admits he has difficulty knowing when to stop on a

Second Time Broken painting. He specialises in land and seascapes, creating them from memory, enhanced by a little imagination. Adam has received numerous awards for his achievements in performing arts and education, and his creative energy is still in full flow, so it probably won’t be long before there’s another project on the horizon.

You can see Adam’s new artwork at Mime in Paddons Row, Tavistock, Monday to Saturday until the end of October. For more information about Adam’s projects and artwork see www. adambenjamin.co.uk. Adam teaches Tai Chi at The Printworks in Tavistock on Monday, Tuesday & Friday mornings and in Calstock on Thursday evenings.

Rosemary Best

Bringing Devon into focus

I liked Dianne Giles the minute I met her. She is one of life’s smiley people. She is also a highly talented, decorated photographer who has captured beautiful portraits of our landscape and community through her lens. Born in Hammersmith, Dianne swapped the urban neighbourhood for a more rural playground when her parents moved to Twyford, Berkshire when she was eleven. After marrying, she and her husband took holidays in Devon and immediately felt at home, returning year on year to explore Dartmoor and its surrounding towns and villages. Enjoying the community spirit of Tavistock, they decided to take the plunge, and relocated in 2015. They both continued to commute, Dianne to her job as a cargo agent for Virgin Atlantic, a role she had held for almost twenty years. After a few months, she accepted a redundancy package from Virgin and began working at White Stuff in Tavistock, rising to assistant manager. Eight years ago, Dianne began posting images from her phone onto Blipfoto, an online photo journal where anyone can upload one photo per day. She received some fantastic feedback and was soon hooked. Inspired to improve she invested in a Nikon beginners’ camera, and before long a series of her abstract photographs were published in the national magazine Practical Photography. In 2016 she entered the prestigious Countryfile calendar competition and to her absolute delight and amazement, her image of a woodland in the mist was selected. This led to a position on the long list panel of judges for three years - a role which she found both inspirational and great fun. She has since had images published in a range of notable magazines including Dartmoor Magazine in which she was a featured photographer in 2018 with a cover image of Greyface Dartmoor Sheep - a dream come true.

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Self-taught via books, magazines and an occasional workshop, her hobby had become something she really wanted to invest in, so with the support of family she took a three-month hiatus from her job and took up the challenge of photographing ‘People of Dartmoor’, a collection of black and white images for exhibition in Home Farm Cafe and Gallery near Bovey Tracey. This led to a further exhibition of local people in the Princetown Visitor Centre. She spent time with farriers, thatchers, farmers, vets, volunteers and a vicar, in the pursuit of capturing natural photographs of a working community. This venture really pushed her out of her comfort zone but she loved every minute and her portraits received universal acclaim.

Dianne’s first love was always the landscape, flora and fauna and she began a project in 2015 capturing Dartmoor throughout the year. She had a book published of her images and has done so every year since, just for herself. She is considering a wider publication in 2025 that will cover ten years of beautiful Dartmoor photographs, but is aware that high quality photography prints come at an expensive retail price. Dianne began volunteering at Wildside, a private garden in Buckland Monachorum which occasionally opens to visitors. Keith Wiley the owner, a keen photographer himself was impressed with Dianne’s Dartmoor images and gave Dianne permission to capture scenes from his garden, with a view to creating a beautiful companion book showcasing the garden throughout the year. It’s a project she is relishing, volunteering for a morning of weeding, then spending the afternoon capturing the ever-changing mood of the garden with the turn of the seasons. In 2021 Dianne entered the RHS photographic competition and was selected for an exhibition in the Saatchi Gallery in Sloane Square. Her portfolio of dark autumnal scenes taken at RHS Rosemoor won a bronze medal and a grand day out to London was had. Dianne now enjoys working for three days a week in the Devon Air Ambulance charity shop in Tavistock, and tries to fit in time with family, dog and her camera around that. She is very self-effacing and despite her natural talent and huge successes, feels she is still an amateur with so much more to learn. Dianne fell in love with Devon a long time ago and does not take it for granted. She feels fortunate to live in this magical place amongst many people who have offered support, friendship and encouragement. She is a good human; warm, enthusiastic and passionate about the moor, its people and traditions, creating a beautiful library of our home at a point in time which will be celebrated for years to come.

Nichola Williams

Photos by Dianne Giles. You can find more details about Dianne’s work at diannejgilesphotography co.uk or facebook.com/diannejaynegiles