National Dance Company Wales has launched a new online programme, KiN: Connected, as part of its desire to create a community for dance online with audiences, participants and the sector.
KiN: Connected will be an online programme which will include some of the most popular and some previously unseen works as well as dance classes for adults and children and a new commissioning opportunity.
Over the last 12 months, NDCWales has been exploring new ways of using digital technologies as part of their work as part of the experimental platform, Laboratori, as well as being a part of the BBC Dance Passion digital day. In response to COVID-19, it has accelerated the launch of its digital programme.
The programme launches on Thursday 16 April with a live-streamed performance at 2PM via Zoom and Facebook Live of all eight company dancers and two apprentice dancers from isolation in their own homes in a reworked version of Alexandra Waierstall’s 2067: Time and Time and Time, which was originally created with for a spring 2020 tour.
On Thursday 23 April, there will be a short dance film inspired by Ed Myhill’s Why Are People Clapping!? in response to the weekly ‘Clap for Carers’, which will be shared online after the national clap at 8PM. The NDCWales daily class will be shared across the UK in partnership with BBC Culture in Quarantine and BBC Cymru Wales on BBC iPlayer on Friday 17 April at 11AM. This week, a ballet class will be taught to the company dancers in isolation and viewers can also join in from home.
The company will also be launching a new initiative, Progression Routes Wales, which will be a new commission for freelancers.
Chief Executive Paul Kaynes said, “dancers communicate in a way that is important for the world right now—by telling stories through visual movement, fusing fitness with creativity. We’re inviting people to join us by watching and dancing themselves: dance is one of the brilliant ways we can feed our artistic sides, and in the process keep fit in our living rooms.”