Mobile Dance creates participative dance projects which support individuals in the development of mobility: in their bodies, their personal development and their relationship to the world around them. We understand co-creative processes as research for collective living: a laboratory in which people from different backgrounds can investigate themes which concern them. We work at the intersection of arts with socio-political concerns.

In the Berlin Mondiale network, Mobile Dance delivers the project JUNCTION, led by Jo Parkes (artistic director) and Barbara Weidner (specialist educator). Since 2014, JUNCTION offers dance workshops in accommodation centres for refugees in Berlin. We now have 5 long-term partnerships with centres across Berlin and work with a team of 30 artists (a quarter of whom have themselves experienced forced migration) and around 1500 people each year.

The project combines the approaches of dance artists with specialist educators to support children and their families in coping with the repercussions of traumatic experiences, arriving in Berlin and managing their current challenging living situation. We offer assistant roles to artists wanting to gather experience of working in this field. All artists are trained in diversity- and trauma-sensitive approaches, receive regular coaching from project founders and meet once every 12 weeks for an artist exchange.

Our motto is „we come to stay“. We are continuously growing, but we only build up new partnerships when the existing ones are stable. The artists teach once a week, every week and the project becomes an integral part of each centre with which we work. The focus is upon a trauma- and diversity-sensitive body training which activates inner resources, develops stamina and strength, and counters the effects of anxiety and stress through breathing and touch. Another important element is improvisation, supporting the participants to be in the „here and now“. Co-creative choreographic processes work with themes relevant to the young people to offer a place to investigate issues affecting them and to expand their own agency and creative potential.

In cooperation with: AWO Refugium Gotenburger Straße, Erstaufnahme-Einrichtung Stresemannstr. / ZUsammenKUNFT, GU Stallschreiberstraße (PRISOD GmbH), Hochschulübergreifendes Zentrum Tanz (HZT) Berlin, Übergangswohnheim Alfred-Randt-Str. (Internationaler Bund) and Uferstudios.

Mobile Dance Website and Facebook page