Did you know that dance works for individuals, groups, and communities in various ways? The benefits of dance are still far from fully utilized. There is wide empirical evidence on the effect of dance on cognitive functions, social relationships, and cultural well-being.
For example, a recent study by Hanna Poikonen, Mari Tervaniemi and Laurel Trainor (1) shows that watching a live dance performance in a real-world environment stimulates our cognitive processes in unique ways. It activates the brain more extensively than watching a videorecorded performance. According to Poikonen, the lead author of the study, such experiences are important for both our body and our brain. Another renowned Finnish brain researcher, Minna Huotilainen, states that dance is one of the most efficient, possibly even the best, form of physical activity. (2)
In a scoping study on the evidence on the role of the arts in improving health and well-being, Daisy Fancourt and Saoirse Finn (3) report numerous benefits of dance, including fostering greater social inclusion in patients with dementia, enhancing children’s developmental maturity and school readiness, and enhancing learning and memory in general. These are only a few examples that DanceWorks Helsinki bases its activities and aims on.
Being aware of the great potential of dance, we at DanceWorks Helsinki aspire to become a game-changer in promoting the visibility and impact of dance art in Finnish society, and beyond.
Our dance work happens through two main channels:
Creating new world-class dance works where fair employment of classically trained
dancers is a key principle
Offering a variety of dance workshops, courses, dance classes and distributing research-based knowledge on how dance works
Why do we emphasize employing classically trained dancers?
We believe that dancers’ well-being is reflected in their performance quality. We are also aware of the stressful work cultures and unsafe training methods connected especially to ballet. Moreover, DanceWorks Helsinki aims to transform the expectations and images of ballet as being mostly for white, lean, and exceptional
individuals. We want to diversify the image of ballet and in that way, contribute to renewing the art form. This way, we also want to encourage everyone interested in ballet and dance start dancing as a hobby, and to enjoy the art form as an audience member.
Together with a growing number of supporters, DanceWorksHelsinki will work to make dance work for all.
1) 1 https://www.helsinki.fi/en/news/brain/dance-experience-visible-brain-activity-dance-spectators
2) https://www.yths.fi/en/news/2023/heres-what-you-might-not-know-about-your-brain-and-learning/?cn-
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