The School of Colours

The show

The “Danse à l’Ecole en Couleurs” project is an initiative of the Compagnie Michèle Anne De Mey in co-opération with the primary section of the Ecole en Couleurs located in Forest. It is an integral part of the work and dreams of Michèle Anne De Mey who has been exploring the role of dance in children’s lives for years. This pilot project aims to lay the foundations for relfection on the role of a professional artist’s affiliation within an educational framework, and to offer children a chance to implement their experiences through the creation of a dance show within a professional framework.

The project, which began in January ’98 is scheduled to take place over a three year period, during which we will follow the same class of pupils from their first year of school (at 6 years of age) until the creation of the show, which is set to take place in September 2000.

Both the school and the parents have welcomed the project with open arms. In fact, the dance workshop in now scheduled for one period a week as a part of the regular curriculum. As our main goal is to lay the foundations for artistic transmission  within the framework of the schoo, we emphasise the omportance of dialogue with the teacher, who attends the workshop, and with the parents, with whom we meet on a regular basis during open classes.

As for the children they discuss the workshop in class and the teacher records their impressions in the Big Dance Workshop Journal. Dialogue has erupted spontaneously. In fact during preparations for their annual school play, the children themselves chose to include a danse show that went so far as to impersonate Michèle Anne and Joanna O’Keeffe (assistant dancer) on stage !

January to June 98
We made many discoveries during this first semester, allowing us to determine the bases for teaching dance in such a way as to make the child award of his/her relationship with the Other, with the group. We chose themes to provoke their imaginations: The world of the sea, cats, rhythm, the group and above all, the joy of dancing…
As a grand finale, a professional show on a professional stage played by children.