Dance & Performance
Academic Research
My research on dance combines ethnography, phenomenology and cognitive science to understand dance as an embodied, ecological practice.
Stage presence
How does presence emerge in dance? I develop a cognitive ecological approach to stage presence across three dance forms, understanding it as plural and distributed across performers, audiences and environments. This work is at the core of my monograph Dancing Presence (Routledge, forthcoming) and of my article in the Nordic Journal of Dance (2023).
Skill, agency and attunement
I investigate how dancers develop skill, perception and embodied knowledge, from interkinaesthetic attunement and shared agency in Contact Improvisation and Body Weather to the transmission of a choreographer’s movement language in contemporary ballet. These questions run through my articles in Synthese (2022) and Performance Research (2021), and my chapters in Collaborative Embodied Performance (Bloomsbury, 2022) and The Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Ballet (OUP, 2021).
Dance Performance
Selected performances from my career as a professional contemporary dancer, including works by William Forsythe, Angelin Preljocaj and Carolyn Carlson.
Human Writes (2006)
by William Forsythe and Kendall Thomas
Guest dancer with The Forsythe Company, Festspielhaus Hellerau, Dresden, Germany.
El Amor Brujo (2004)
Pergine Spettacolo Aperto
Opera by Manuel de Falla, choreography by Maria Pia di Mauro.
International tour in Italy (Teatro Tenda Pergine; Teatro la Fenice, Venice); Spain (Auditori Josep Carreras, Vila Seca), and Portugal (Teatro Municipal Sá de Miranda, Viana do Castelo).
ALIEN (2021)
Choreography by Taneli Torma - LocationX
Kunstbygningen Filosoffen Odense, Denmark.
Fire Sketch (2006)
Choreography by Angelin Preljocaj
music by Laurent Garnier
Pavillon Noir, Aix-en-Provence, France.
Ice (2004-2005)
Choreography by Carolyn Carlson
Cannes Jeune Ballet, National tour in France (La Halle de Villars, Fontainebleau, Paris; Théâtre de La Licorne, Cannes, Théâtre Hilton Noga Croisette, Cannes; Festival Made in Cannes, Danses de Mai, CNSDMP Paris; Festival Les Nuits du Château, Mandelieu).