YOUNG CREATIVES

One Dance UK’s Young Creatives is an exciting two-year programme for young people who are interested in developing their choreographic skills and artistic potential. The programme provides a wonderful opportunity for young dancers to learn from industry leading artists and, through mentoring, supports them in creating an original piece of dance work which is premiered in front of a live audience at a professional venue.

Throughout the first year of the programme, Young Creatives participate in a series of workshop sessions with industry professionals to help them develop their creative ‘toolkit’.

Year two is all about making work supported through high-quality mentoring and face-toface workshops. This year’s cohort have been supported and inspired by Creative Lead Rhian Robbins and Mentors Kate Flatt OBE, Vidya Patel and John-William Watson, who have offered remarkable insight into their own practice and encouraged and nurtured the creative voice of each young choreographer.

“I am incredibly privileged to have been part of the journey with our young choreographers. From our very first meeting, their openness and creativity has been truly inspiring. Making work is exposing and takes courage and it’s so wonderful to see the generous spirit and support for each other that the young artists and their dancers alike have developed.

The choreographers have devised and worked with their dancers in their own communities, all then meeting in person to share their work in process. As well as choreographing and rehearsing their work they also take responsibility for staging, lighting and costume with the guidance of their wonderful Mentors.

The Young Creatives programme allows participants space to explore, challenge and develop their physical voices in whatever direction it takes them. Their commitment and growth over the last few months have been awesome and humbling in equal measures and I have no doubt the future of choreography is in very good hands!”

Rhian Robbins Creative Lead Young Creatives

“Being part of the Young Creatives programme was one of the best things I have ever done. I completed the two-year programme with a newfound love for choreography and collaboration and a completely new outlook on the creative arts industry. The programme has given me the confidence to believe in and be proud of my creative ideas.”

Jasmine Ainley-Kaur, 2022 Young Creative

Scan the QR code to see this year’s Young Creatives in full flow at the start of their creative process during our launch day activities!

Curtain Raiser

Flora by Dance City Youth Company, choreographed by Emily-Fleur Peake and the dancers

Steadfast by Dance City Senior Youth Dance choreographed by Michaela Wate, Amy Becke, and the dancers Company

The Dance City Youth Company (performing first) and the Dance City Senior Youth Company (performing second) are Dance City’s in-house flagship dance companies. Based on a foundation of contemporary dance, these companies develop different dance techniques led by professional dancers and dancers are supported to learn choreographic skills as well as achieve their Arts Awards. They are dedicated semi-professional groups who perform their work at least three times a year.

The Youth Company provides an opportunity for young dancers aged 12-17 to build their dance skills with a dedicated group and rehearse pieces for performance at a range of showcase events. The Senior Youth Company began in 2021 to give further opportunities, post Covid-19, to the more senior dancers of the Youth Company who lost most of their studio time during the pandemic. Made up of dancers aged 15-18, they work with talented dance artists who support them to develop their dance and performance skills and hone their stagecraft and choreography.

Selfhood

Choreographed by: Maximus Mawle

Mentor: John-William Watson

As a choreographer, this is the first time I am presenting work on a professional stage. I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity and challenge. My dancers are fellow students at college, and bring their own individual flair to the choreography.

What is personality? If you were to peel back what makes an identity, and an individual, would we like what we see underneath? In philosophy there is the idea of ‘the shadow’; what would happen if it were set free?

The Queens That Played Espionage

Choreographed by: Amber Griffiths-Rowe

Mentor: John-William Watson

Currently studying at The Brit School, Centre for Advanced Training (The Place) and Crouch End School of Dance, I’m a North London based dancer/choreographer. My dancers similarly train at The Brit School alongside me in a variety of styles.

James Bond, George Smiley. Where are the tales of smart female spies that changed history? I explore the realistic, desexualised accounts of women in a male dominated profession, so they are appreciated as their male counterparts have been.

Glimpse Of Us

Choreographed by: Blythe Hood

Mentor: Vidya Patel

Andrew and I have been dance partners since 2019 when we were both students at the Orpheus Centre which is a performing arts college for young people with disabilities. We currently dance with Tailfeatherdance. Now being a Young Creative I have finally been given the chance to create a piece for us both that has real meaning for us as dancers.

I wanted to explore a dance showing that people with Down syndrome can be just as expressive and graceful as any other dancer. To begin with the dancers hide behind a mask and then at the very end they reveal their true identity by removing the mask.

Epithimia Yia Vasilia

Choreographed by: Bobbi Walker

Mentor: Vidya Patel

I have been training at Phoenix Youth Academy for five years, and CAPA College for two, where I have met the dancers in my piece. We train in a variety of dance styles and are so grateful for this opportunity.

Epithimia Yia Vasilia is based on Aesop’s fable The Frogs Who Desired A King. A group of frogs ask for a leader, and they are given a shock with the terrifying log supplied. After initially being tentative, the frogs soon realise the log has no power.

Vagrants

Choreographed by: Esme Peal

Mentor: Vidya Patel

As a dancer and choreographer I’m grounded in contemporary with acrobatic and balletic influences. Myself and my amazing dancers study together at sixth form and have collaborated with some of our brilliant musician friends to create this work.

We portray a flock of yellow warblers, migrating south from Alaska. Their journey was disrupted by the devastating 2020 California wildfires. Air pollution from the blazes forced a route diversion over desert lands where they starved, simply falling out of the sky.

Behind The Sun

Choreographed by: Chloe Olivia Fear

Mentor: John-William Watson

As founder of the Fearless Collective, I like to explore the fusion of hip hop and contemporary dance styles to create powerful dance theatre. My piece’s dancers and I are based in the South West and are all dance graduates.

Behind The Sun is an expression of the fight to find the light. The dancers explore how supporting each other gives them strength to escape the darkness. This piece allows the viewer to draw on personal experiences of finding their light.

A Changing Connection

Choreographed by: Isabel Ava Hancock

Mentor: Kate Flatt OBE

I am excited to be a part of the Young Creatives programme and look forward to the opportunity to share my work. I am currently training at CAPA College, I am grateful for the support of my mentor, teachers and dancers.

My piece explores the use of mobile phones and its overall effect on society. I hope for my piece to highlight the behaviours and relationships people have with phones; both good and bad.

A Freudian Slip

Choreographed by: Esther Carr

Mentor: Kate Flatt OBE

I met my dancers through our university dance team, working together on various showcases and pieces of choreography. Most recently, I choreographed for The Great Gatsby at The Oxford Playhouse, as well as several pieces of dance for film.

Defined by the Oxford Languages Dictionary as ‘an unintentional error [...] revealing subconscious feelings’, A Freudian Slip explores this literally and metaphorically, in a sometimes uncomfortable, sometimes comedic, itching representation of the subconscious and suppressed exposing itself through dance.