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This ballet company focuses on the mental health of the dancers

This ballet company focuses on the mental health of the dancers

At Azara Ballet, dancers are not expected to make eye contact with the directors and choreographers. When company members need a spontaneous break from the bright stage lights during rehearsal, they take one. They also receive clear instructions on hair and make-up long before the performance.

At Azara, the health of the dancers is a priority. Founded in 2022 by autistic (and married) dancers Kate Flowers and Martin Roosaare, the Sarasota and Bradenton, Florida-based company is a haven for neurodivergent artists. (The company consists of 10 dancers, not all of whom are neurodivergent.)

“When I dance,” Flowers said, “as long as it’s in a good environment and a safe space, expression through nonverbal movement helps me a lot.”

Azara addresses a gap in the world of dance: the need for spaces where people with autism, ADHD, or other conditions that fall under the broad term “neurodivergent” can freely experience the art form. Both anecdotal and empirical evidence suggests that there is a close connection between dance and these neurological diseases. This relationship has become an area of ​​increasing focus for researchers, artists and performing arts organizations in recent years.

In November, Azara gathered for a run-through of his program “Voices of Azara” at the Black Box Theater, where the show would soon take place. The atmosphere in the theater felt both active—dancers warming up, checking steps, chatting—and calm: there was dim lighting, pleasantly cool air, and a seemingly innate awareness among the performers of the volume of their voices.

At the start of the rehearsal, Roosaare gave the dancers an overview of the schedule for the next three hours. They then went through the four parts – all written by company members – before receiving notes. While the dancers were performing, the music was never overly loud and corrections were never shouted.

For the most part, however, the rehearsal didn't look much different than that of a small dance company. But what “makes a big difference,” said autistic dancer Rebecca Kimsey, is the level of humanity and consideration in the studio.

“Martin and Kate have been very accepting and understanding of everything that comes up,” she said, “e.g. E.g. if I experience a day where I wake up with a migraine due to overstimulation.”

She added: “When we're in rehearsal and things happen very quickly, they still don't elicit corrections, which can alarm or frighten people if they're focused.”

Flowers said she has always been drawn to dance. “Especially with autism, having structure is really helpful,” she said. “Dance really offers that. It makes sense why I was drawn to dance and why it kept drawing me back.”

Research confirms these experiences. The results suggest that dance may be unusually well-suited to complementing the strengths that come with autism or certain neurological disorders while alleviating some of the difficulties.

Dr. Jessica Eccles, a researcher at Brighton and Sussex Medical School in England, studies the way some medical conditions intersect with hypermobility (a greater range of motion than usual) and creativity. “Attention to detail, memory, passions, thinking outside the box — all of those things are probably useful assets for dancers,” Eccles said. “A large proportion of dancers may be neurodivergent but may not be recognized. They may not have diagnoses.”

Julia Basso, the director of Virginia Tech's Embodied Brain Lab, has provided further evidence of the connection between dance and neurodivergence by measuring brain waves. In a group of musical theater artists, most of whom were autistic, dance and performance were shown to increase intrabrain synchronization—the neural connections in a performer's brain—as well as interbrain synchronization, or the connections made between multiple people. This suggests that dance can play an important role in things like social bonding and reducing anxiety, which are common challenges, Basso said.

Roosaare and Flowers observed the positive effects of dance on a group of autistic preschoolers who participated in Azara's Atypical Dance Initiative. Students usually have a hard time concentrating in school during the day, Roosaare says, “but when it comes to dancing, they are always attentive and engaged.”

While Azara takes a dance approach to inclusion, most companies focus primarily on the audience. The New York City Ballet, for example, recently hosted a sensory performance of The Nutcracker and has another sensory event (a Balanchine triple performance) planned for May. Other companies have also implemented this practice, largely as part of the “Nutcracker” season.

“The audience felt welcomed, they felt supported, they didn’t feel judged,” Meghan Gentile, City Ballet’s associate director of education, said of a sensory performance last spring. “There are more and more conversations happening about how we can all make our performances a little more accessible. There’s this new lens focused on our work.”

At Azara, all performances are designed with neurodiversity in mind. The Lumberyard Center for Film and the Performing Arts in New York City is taking a similar approach with “Seats on the Spectrum,” an accessible program designed for easy implementation in theaters. The pilot version, which debuted in October, is available at New Victory Theater, HERE Arts Center and Roundabout Theater Company.

Adrienne Willis, Lumberyard's executive director and artistic director, said: “While the individual performances and the individual festivals are fantastic and reach so many people, they don't reach a sufficient number of the population.” She added that Lumberyard is interested in Making accessibility “more economically viable for theaters.”

At many of these events, audience members are offered sensory kits—fidget toys, earplugs, noise-cancelling headphones—and a visual and text-based description of what they can expect from their theater visit. There are often designated, less crowded seating areas for neurodivergent audience members, and during the show, the lights in the hall are never completely dimmed, lighting and sound effects are dimmed, and visitors are free to come and go as needed.

These seem like big changes. But Azara dancer Kimsey said that when some of her friends attended these performances, “They told me, 'I hardly notice any difference;' 'I didn't know it was a sensory day.'”

Still, she added, “For those who need these changes, it's a lifeline. “It connects you to something you might never experience otherwise.”

The next generation of dance artists is developing the tools to also embrace neurodivergence. At the University of Southern California's Glorya Kaufman School of Dance, Patrick Corbin, associate professor of dance practice, co-founded a course called “Dance and Neurodiversity” with a neuroscientist and occupational therapist and neurodiverse theater artists. Autism.

By combining science, movement and community engagement, Corbin hopes students will learn how dance affects the brain and better understand these conditions as a whole.

“We develop dance-based strategies and use all of these things to figure out how we can learn more about walking in someone else's shoes,” Corbin said. “Instead of trying to draw people with autism into our world, perhaps we could find a bridge to connection by going into their world.”

As Azara rehearses, it becomes clear that connection is a goal. Each dance piece has a clear meaning or story, and the movements chosen by the choreographers are neither too obscure to be understood nor so literal that they seem trite. The dancers move with confidence, with a sense of abandon and flow; they are in their element.

“For me, choreography helps with expression,” said Roosaare, “to be able to portray certain feelings, emotions and ideas that are usually a little more difficult to convey.”

“I feel like in the world of dance there are a lot of people with undiagnosed autism who find it an outlet for expression.”

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