"Touchdown Dance has changed my body and my life."

Touchdown Dance, based in Manchester, works locally, regionally, nationally and internationally within communities and professional dance. Our renowned workshop provision has taken us to Poland, Germany, Australia, and the USA to involve people with a visual impairment in dance or to provide training for professionals. We have been referred to as world experts in the delivery of dance workshops with our specialist methods and processes using touch and sensory feedback techniques. These are effective for all dance settings as well as within health and education. For more on this check the workshop page for the range of settings and examples.

Touchdown was founded by Steve Paxton and Anne Kilcoyne in 1986 at Dartington College of Arts and was moved to the North West when Katy Dymoke took over in 1994. Many people have been involved in the work and have grown and moved on to work further in the field. Some past projects have involved partnerships and collaborations with national organisations such as the RNIB, LIME (Hospital Arts), and local arts organisations and professional centres, such as Theatre Resource, The Place, Cleveland Arts, Alternative Futures, Ludus Dance, Art Link West Yorkshire and the Royal Festival Hall. We have also delivered courses for dance students at many universities. There is no doubt that the work is special and specialised and leaves a legacy of insight, understanding and fundamental principles to ensure a long-term impact and development.

The Dance Company evolved from the long-term perspective of providing opportunities for workshop participants to work towards performance. The first production in the North West in 2000 involved three community dancers and three professionals. The current company involves three visually impaired and three sighted dancers, and all are working at a professional standard in performance. We allow a longer period for development and touring to enable the work to develop at its own pace.

Our main aim is to ensure access to opportunity and information in the dance world. Our work may be specifically about the inclusion of visually impaired people but our provision is open to both disabled and non-disabled people. Our objectives tie in with social inclusion policies, from the regional arts and national priorities right down to the needs of individual participants, whether in the workshops or the company. Our specialism is in the use of touch as a mirror in the learning process and the excavation of touch as a language of communication, with the intention to normalise the perception of touch and to reaffirm its potency in both learning and teaching practices.

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