New Shoes Get Started: Dance Workshop with Johnny Autin

I’m Tara and I am the Next Generation Project Assistant. It is usually me who writes these blogs and it is usually me who looks after the New Shoes workshops here at mac birmingham.

The reason I am telling you this is because I have seen a lot of workshops, with a lot of young people, by a lot of artists and when I saw Johnny Autin leading an intensive dance warm-up with a group of young people who didn’t look remotely interested, I thought “this is going to be interesting.”

And it was, these young people were hiding in the corners, heads down on phones at the start of the session and by the end of the session they were running up and down our dance studio with their best dance moves and lifts! The transformation in just 2 short hours was incredible.

This image was taken as part of  a project called "Pathos" by Autin Dance Theatre

It was clear when I was speaking to the group after the session that they were excited and overwhelmed by what they managed to achieve in the session, everyone was smiling. “The artist was really nice and encouraging” said one member of the group.

One young person summed up their experience by saying “I learnt new moves, I also learnt to cooperate and the teaching was good!”

Mostly the group were blown away by the fact that they learnt to lift someone as part of a dance sequence during the session but young people also explained that they learn some other things that they hadn’t bargained for too such as teamwork and communication skills.

“When I didn’t remember moves, others did, so they could help me”

To find out what other creative sessions New Shoes has to offer click here 

To find out more about Autin Dance Theatre click here 

To find out more about Manmade click here