Israel & Lee’s reflections on working with young artists

We are delighted to launch the website for ilDance’s initiative, COMPASS, a project that the ilDance team has been working towards, designing and imagining over the past few years.

Working with emerging artists has always been a true passion, as well as an ongoing practice for our directors Israel Aloni and Lee Brummer. Recognising the gap of possibilities that exists for emerging artists in the contemporary dance sector, Israel and Lee dreamt up COMPASS which will create a new infrastructure for young and emerging dance artists across Sweden and will support them in their professional development.

Through COMPASS, we at ilDance very much look forward to meeting and working with many young and emerging dance artists across Sweden. We are excited to build, design and facilitate this project side by side with emerging dance artists, partners and collaborators across the country. More detailed information about what this means will be published shortly. COMPASS is made possible through the support of Svenska Postkodstiftelsen.

When asking Lee and Israel about their work with young artists, here is what they said.

Lee Brummer: When working with young dancers I get very excited about where their worlds will meet mine. It always proves to be a beautiful and open exchange, I bring my knowledge and experience, they bring theirs and together we create something new.

In both Israel and my work with young dancers it is important for us to give them a voice, or more specifically to give space to their voice and to give them the confidence and tools to use their voice and realise that what they offer is valid, important and huge.

Both Israel and I are thrilled to be in a situation and position in which we can share and support other artists in the beginning of their professional journey and process.

Israel Aloni: Younger artists tend to be less sculpted by political and strategic confinements which the pursuit of professional career might impose on an individual’s decision making processes.

Whilst they are still forging their particular articulations as artists and perhaps have been oppressed by rigid systemic hierarchies, they possess youthful vitality and curiosity which are immanent to a creative process. Therefore, working with younger artists is an invaluable opportunity to embark on a process which is grounded in authenticity and genuineness.

Whilst they might be young as artists, they have got many years of experience being a human in the world. In the way that I work, the artists’ corporeal, emotional and intellectual intelligence beyond their journey as dance artists are invaluable to the creative process. The work with young artists offers incredible reciprocity, both my and their artistic practices expand.