International Dance Day message
April 28, 2020
On April 29th the International Dance Day is being celebrated.
This year's message author is Gregory Vuyani MAQOMA, a South African dancer, actor,
choreographer and dance educator.
It was during an interview I had recently that
I had to think deeply about dance, what does it mean to me? In my response, I
had to look into my journey, and I realized that it was all about purpose and
each day presents a new challenge that needs to be confronted, and it is
through dance that I try to make sense of the world.
We are leaving through unimaginable
tragedies, in a time that I could best describe as the post-human era. More
than ever, we need to dance with purpose, to remind the world that humanity
still exists. Purpose and empathy need
to prevail over years and years of undeniable virtual landscape of dissolution
that has given rise to a catharsis of universal grief conquering the sadness,
the hard reality that continues to permeate the living confronted by death,
rejection and poverty. Our dance must more than ever give a strong signal to
the world leaders and those entrusted with safeguarding and improving human
conditions that we are an army of furious thinkers, and our purpose is one that
strives to change the world one step at a time. Dance is freedom, and through
our found freedom, we must free others from the entrapments they face in
different corners of the world. Dance is not political but becomes political
because it caries in its fibre a human connection and therefore responds to
circumstances in its attempt to restore human dignity.
As we dance with our
bodies, tumbling in space and tangling together, we become a force of movement
weaving hearts, touching souls and providing healing that is so desperately
needed. And purpose becomes a single hydra-headed, invincible and indivisible
dance. All we need now is to dance some
more!!!!
Read more about Gregory Vuyani MAQOMA.
International Dance Day was created by the Dance Committee of the International Theatre Institute, the main partner for the performing arts of UNESCO. International Dance Day is celebrated every year since 1982 on April 29th, the anniversary of the birth of Jean-Georges Noverre (1727-1810).