Melanie Manchot says: “Dance is a dynamic, physical language, allowing us to communicate and connect through gesture, rhythm and movement. Across diverse cultures and histories, it is inherent in all of us and brings us together.[…] Without clubs and safe spaces, there is less dancing. Without dancing, we are less human.” 

Weave through Dance Out’s outdoor gallery and learn more about how it came to be in this interview with  Kathryn Johnson Head of Exhibitions and Sarah Bentley Head of Marketing and Communications at RWA.

Dance Out is the first time the RWA has placed dance at the centre of a major exhibition. Can you tell us what sparked the idea for it and why it feels like the right moment for this exhibition?  

KJ: Dance is joyful and this is moment in the UK where we all need that joy and social connection more than ever.
The idea for the show came first from artist and co-curator David Remfry RA, who has spent decades painting the dancers he saw in nightclubs in New York, London and Hull. It grew from that point, to include a spectacular new film commission made in Bristol by Melanie Manchot, and other fantastic artists inspired by grassroots dance and club culture including Denzil Forrester and Paul Dash. It taps into a current surge of interest in, and respect for, the cultural and artistic value of these dance spaces – many of which have been under threat since the pandemic. ‘Dance Out’ is a vibrant, joyful, summer exhibition that everyone can take part in, via the Beat Blocks dance floor.

Bristol is rich with culture-shifting creative talent, especially in the art, music, and dance scenes. How is this exhibition – which is shaped by paintings, drawings and film across decades of dance culture – reflecting that? 

KJ: Melanie Manchot’s ‘Night Moves’ shows Bristol-based dancers and groups performing, at night, in surprising locations across the city from Stoke Park to Ashton Gate Bridge and Trenchard St car park. There are skateboarders and dancers of all ages across ballet, salsa, reggaeton, Jungle, and Morris dance. It’s an incredible window into the cultural melting-pot that is Bristol and the RWA, as Bristol’s oldest art gallery, is proud to commission and display this new work that captures this incredible city today.
In addition, we have a brilliant soundtrack to the exhibition consisting of curated DJ mixes from Devolicious, Josephine Gyasi and d4rling – all DJs responsible for keeping dance floors fuelled across Bristol. And during the exhibition run, local dancers and dance groups will be taking over the gallery space for an exciting and ambitious live programme of classes, workshops, performances and more.

From a haptic Beat Blocks dancefloor to an immersive installation by award-winning artist Melanie Manchot to rarely seen artwork by artists like Denzil Forrester, the programme is brimming with variety. Who do you hope will engage with it – both inside the gallery and out in the city?  

 KJ: The RWA is for everyone! We hope that anyone who dances, for fun, in their kitchen with their kids – professionally, dad dancing or whatever, will come to the exhibition or take part in our programme of events.

How does bringing the exhibition into an outdoor gallery extend or enhance the experience of the exhibition beyond the gallery walls?  

KJ: Sarah Bentley and Melanie Manchot, the artist behind ‘Night Moves’, wanted to explore ways of distributing aspects of ‘Night Moves’ online and in the city. Melanie first discovered many of the Bristol-based dancers through their social media channels. In conversation with her we wanted to bring the finished film back into the spaces where the dancers are living and working every day, in the city, outside the art gallery. Tom Sparey (the production photographer) had captured brilliant and powerful images during the shoot, and these are showcased across the billboard outdoor gallery sites. Melanie worked to make the stills also suggest movement, sometimes using sequences of images in a style inspired by early photography from Eadweard Muybridge. We’re thrilled to see photographs of the billboards ‘in the wild’ popping up on social media too, so the project is really coming full circle!

What was the process behind selecting the poster artwork for Dance Out – were there specific visual or emotional qualities you felt would translate best into an outdoor setting?  

SB: We are very lucky to have worked with a Bristol based designer, Lorna Harrington, who really got our brief. This is the most ambitious programme the RWA has ever done, and the exhibition is as much about what is on the walls as what is happening in and around the space – so there is a lot of collateral to create with this campaign and we wanted to have an identify for the campaign that could work with all the artwork in exhibition as well as the programme of events that are happening throughout the run.

With the RWA we want to celebrate our heritage whilst embracing the future, and we really think that Lorna did an excellent job of doing this with Dance Out.