This transcript is from an interview that was first published on 28th of June 2019. This transcript has been edited slightly to help with clarity, the audio of this episode and more information can be found here.
In this interview was conducted by Patricia Hayes Cavanagh who was an Australian Youth Dance Festival, Youth Ambassadors.
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Patricia: [0:47]
Hello, how are you?
Anna Kenrick:
I'm good. Thank you. I'm very nice to talk to you again.
Patricia:
So you're a very experienced teacher. What kind of brought you to teaching at first.
Anna Kenrick: [1:06]
I think I always knew that I wanted to work with children. And my mum's a teacher, I don't know if that's had something to do with it in the genetics, but um, my dad works in social and health care. So working in this kind of field, I don't know, maybe it's in my DNA. I went to Northern School of Contemporary Dance in Leeds, a long time ago. And when I was there, I always had this strong feeling that my career was going to be about performing and education. I knew I wanted to teach, very passionate about young people. I actually did my dissertation thesis in my third year on working with children with autism. I had a very strong passion working with children with a range of disabilities and I did a lot of that in my early career. And yeah, I always knew that performing wasn't my sole aim in life and combining the two...and the company that I wanted to work with, which I did go on to work with a couple years later, was called Ludus. They were solely set up to create performances for young people and create educational dance, contemporary dance workshops, around the show. So yeah, so luckily, I started working with them quite early on in my career, which gave me a good foundation and core training in high quality educational dance. And the rest is history.
Patricia: [2:36]
Were there any teachers who inspired you?
Anna Kenrick
Yes, so in college my teacher in education was a lady called, Allison, that's terrible, forgot her last name. She was an inspiration to me at Northern School of Contemporary Dance, as was, Sharon Watson who is now Artistic Director of Phoenix, in a different way - not in terms of my teaching, I mean, she was a great teacher, but in terms of being a strong, female role model she was amazing. Then, when I went on to Ludus, my kind of line manager and teacher was a woman called Gil Graystone, who was very inspirational. She trained at Laban, back when Laban first opened, and she was fundamental for me at developing my knowledge and skills in educational dance and what that means and what we offer young people through dance. And yeah, I still quote her a lot and use her teaching her lot 20 years later.
Patricia:
What kind of qualities do you think makes a good teacher? Like, what do you want to give to your students, every time you take a class?
Anna Kenrick: [4:02]
Someone who's passionate, I always want my passion for what I do to come through. My passion for what dance can give us as individuals, my passion about, you know, just the beauty of what you can get from moving, mentally and physically. What you can create and give to other people through dance. So passion, energy and fun, you know, I always try and make my sessions very energetic and fun. I mean, fundamentally, we're put on this earth to enjoy ourselves hopefully. So making dance something that people are enjoying. So being positive, creating an atmosphere of inclusivity. That I am not the fountain of all knowledge and my students are the vessels. I fundamentally believe that teaching is a two-way process, however much experience the teachers got, whatever age and stage the students are at, there should always be a two-way learning process from each other. And the connection. Teachings about making connections with whoever and making sure the connections are made between the people in the class. So the people who work for YDance, you know, when they come on board, all the team have got a fantastic energy as people. They're quite energetic, positive, smiley, gregarious, people you would want to connect with. And having that skills knowledge and motivation behind that is very important. Yeah, making sure people who come in my sessions, whether it's choreographing for national or teacher training, a sense of fun and enjoyment and connection.
Patricia: [6:12]
Oh, lovely. You've kind of mentioned like, just started going into a little bit ago. But what's your kind of history and journey with youth dance?
Anna Kenrick: [6:24]
Well, I think, as I mentioned to you last time, I think I might be the only woman who spent her whole career in Youth Dance, so far, I mean, I still got another 20 years hopefully. But yes, teaching was always something that I wanted to do, I was very interested in. And so yes, I went when I was a teenager, I didn't how far you want me to go back but as a teenager, I went to Saturday morning dance classes, and Tuesday, Thursday night dance classes at dance school. I also went to a youth dance company at my local dance agency, so Dance City in Newcastle. So I went to a creative contemporary experience once a week, and carried on with that and then I actually wanted to do the cruises and be more of a commercial dancer. A lot of my friends had gone down that route. So decided to go to Northern School just to do their foundation course, develop my technique. And then that was a plan, at that point, I kind of fell in love with contemporary dance and decided to do my degree at Northern, so that I finished it around 22. From there, I went down to London, I worked as a freelancer with The Place education department with Magpie Dance Company, who are a community based company who work with people with range of different disabilities. I worked with Anjali Dance Company, which is a company ran in a professional way with four dancers who have disabilities, mainly Down syndrome, and they also have a youth company. I was the one that ran that for a couple years. Then I got a job with Ludus, who as I said, were the kind of company I was aiming for, I was actually planning to go to Australia - I was going to audition and move to Australia where my best friend was living and Ludus was my last audition before I kind of bought my ticket, so I was a bit fed up with the whole UK / London dance scene, and I actually got in to Ludus. So, I decided to stay with Ludus for six years, three tours and as I said, that gave me the underpinning and grounding that I think every community and youth dance artist really should have before they're allowed to work with our young people. So that was performing internationally and nationally. I finished there when I was about 30, decided I didn't want to do it anymore. We used to tour a lot to Scotland, to the childrens festivals up here, so I contacted YDance because I knew they existed and actually got a job as a teacher with one of them, on the big projects and then the project director left and I wanted a career change so I went into project directing, got her job. And then the Artistic Director left about five years later, and I interviewed for that job and then took over the company about six years ago.
Patricia:
Wonderful. How has your work in youth dance kind of evolved going from performing to becoming like a producer and a director like, how has it shifted your perspective?
Anna Kenrick: [9:43]
Oh, oo, well, yeah, I mean, I thought when I first graduated Northern, you know, I think as we all do, as most people do, I thought I knew everything about teaching and replicating the kind of dance classes that I had been in for three years, you know, at college. I thought that was the way - little did I know that I probably knew very little at the time. You know, now my job is to look at the sector in Scotland to look at the sector in UK and Internationally and the work that YDance does across the three different areas – develop, support, dance in different communities with different young people in Scotland and how we can learn from what's going on down south and internationally, but also make connections. We have a connection with Australia, you know, this is probably I think, the third year we're going back to Australia. So my job now is really, you know, to ensure that the artists of the future in terms of my team, are growing and developing so that high quality work is getting into more communities and working with more young people. I have far more of a strategic role. I actually also choreograph more in this job than I ever did. When I was at Northern, choreography was something quite alien to me, I hadn't had done a lot and (choreography was) kind of sold as for the gifted few who were born as choreographers, the rest of us, you know, couldn't go down that line. So, I have kind of when I joined YDance, Andy Howitt, actually my predecessor here, saw something in the choreography that was making and actually pushed me to do more. So, I started doing more and more work with one of our courses called Project Y in the summer and then obviously, I created National Youth Dance Company when I took over as artistic director and then created more. My skills as a choreographer far, far more developed than they were when I was a younger artist. God, lots of things have evolved. My knowledge in how to work with different communities, what different communities young people need, that there needs to be many pathways and progression for young people in different communities to access dance at different levels, and then be able to work their way through into creating dance if so, or just keep it as something that keeps them healthy and happy mentally and physically. So, yes, does that answer your question?
Patricia: [12:36]
Yeah, wonderfully. It's amazing. It's so incredible to hear everything that goes into youth dance, because as a youth, myself, I always just kind of show up and have fun, but it's always lovely to hear all of this stuff that goes into it, you know?
Anna Kenrick:
Yeah, there's a lot of thinking all the time. All the work that YDance do, and I know that people in Australia work the same, but we talk about what the session is giving about dance and through dance. So, what was the young person learning about dance as an artform or as a subject if we’re in educational settings, but also what is a young person learning through dance. Different sessions and different strands that we run have - So you know, we work with young mums, teenage mums, we also work Polmont Prison and the balance of the ‘through and about’ is mostly weighted to the through dance. We're looking at these young people gaining confidence and resilience and self-esteem and all those skills that dance can give us more probably so than what they're learning about dance. Whereas National Youth Dance Company, you know, it's about the dance, it's about making the piece of art, however, through that, I'm always thinking what are these young dancers learning through. So what am I giving them in terms of them developing their confidence in creativity, choreographic confidence in their own bodies, confidence in their own views and opinions. You know, so, hopefully a good dance session, whether it's with whatever community, should be multi-layered in terms of what are we learning about dance, but also what we’re learning through dance, because if we just focus on what the kids are learning about dance, we forget they’re human beings and that we should be developing them as human beings too.
Patricia: [14:27]
So, over your fantastic career, you’ve worked with many different companies and collaborated with them. What makes a collaboration special to you?
Anna Kenrick: [14:45]
Ah, Yeah, the chance to work with somebody else and have somebody else's brain to negotiate and play with. When I first met you, was with QL2 dance company, so Ruth Osbourne is obviously a little bit older than me and been doing this for a lot longer, so working with people in the industry, especially females, who have more experience so I can learn, I think we never stop learning and we should never think that we're at the pinnacle of our knowledge and skills and understanding because we never are. Primarily collaboration means that I can work with someone else and learn from them. It also gives a chance to see somebody else's take on costumes, and lighting and the craft of navigating the space in choreography and how they create movement and different creative tasks. We all we all have our way of working and shaking that up, I think is really important. This year, when I come to Australia in a very short time, I'm working with Jayden Hicks, at Transit, which is very exciting. We've had a far more developed collaboration leading up to and I think I've learned that from working with Ruth. We also did another collaboration in France, with Josette Baïz in April. And I think this long run-in that Jayden and I have had about talking about costumes and music and we've actually choreographed a little section either side of the globe, and then we've got ideas to come together, is working really well. But that's only been developed by doing quite a few of these collaborations and knowing how they work and how they can work and how we can make them better. Basically, collaboration for me ensures that the process can be even more exciting than working by yourself and can shake your own process up and also gives the young dancers that I work with a completely different experience.
Patricia: [16:58]
Have there been any collaborations that you've come away from that have just shifted your perspective completely? It might be on dance in general or your process when you choreograph or just on life itself, good or bad?
Anna Kenrick: [17:15}
As I mentioned that, in April, we went to a little place outside Marseille called Aix en Provence, which very beautiful part of France and worked with Josette Baïz, who is another woman who probably early 60s, about 20 years older than me. I loved watching her work and found her - in terms of my process, I really learned some valuable ways of working from her just in looking at her attention to detail. She works more from a rep-based process than I do. I work far more from a blank sheet of paper process and see what the dances give me. I think it shifted my perspective on how we can use rep to create something new, maybe, and how it can be a jumping off point. Also, in terms of detail and precision in terms of how she worked with her dancers and was a really good learning experience for me just to be reminded of, and to see her clarity and her depth of detail. What else? So yes, that was a good one this year. I think Commonwealth Youth Dance Festival, where I went to places like Africa and India to work with a couple of the groups who are coming over to the festival - just going out to places that don't have the infrastructure that countries like the UK, or Europe or Australia do have, in terms of general economic infrastructure, but also, then obviously, infrastructure and funding for the arts, and then primarily anything for the young people. I think it just reminds us, and I believe, that every person should go away and visit some place in the world at least once in their life, to remind us that things are sometimes tough with funding in the UK, or we feel that there's not enough resources etcetera, but I think going to India or Africa just reminds us, the infrastructures that we do have and the resources that we do have. It may be that economically, but also in terms of the connections in the sector, we have a very strong down sector in Scotland, small but strong. Having that resource in terms of each other and learning from each other is a thing a lot of artists in some countries don't have at all. They work very independently without economic infrastructure and also any other artists really to bounce from. So, I think, if I'm still on question, the collaboration sometimes just reminds us, going out to other countries reminds us what we do have and the benefits of what we do have and not taking anything too much for granted and realising the bigger perspective sometimes of the way in which we work.
Patricia: [20:28}
Do you see a difference between Youth Dance and International Youth Dance, are there different attitudes?
Anna Kenrick: [20:41]
As I mentioned, we've built quite a strong relationship with Australia now. This is our third visit, so back in Oh, you better remind me Patricia...
Patricia:
In 2016.
Anna Kenrick:
Yes, I was pregnant with my second child. And we came to work with QL2 in Canberra and then developed a relationship with some other youth dance companies there. Then we went back last year and worked with Adam Wheeler and Yellow Wheel in Melbourne and this year we’re going back to Melbourne and doing working with Transit. I think we've developed that relationship primarily with Australia because it's probably the country in the world furthest away, which has the same youth dance sector as the UK. So, England and Scotland have a very similar youth dance infrastructure and place quite a lot of importance on youth and community dance and the benefits of it, as does Australia. We've tried other collaborations in other countries and there's less of a similarity, actually in Europe or definitely in America. In America, what we found is not the same ethos of youth dance that we kind of work towards. More rep-based work or more kind of competition type work. The same with Europe. Some companies, like Belgium seems to have some youth dance going on there, but a lot of the European countries have a more private dance school sector, or maybe smaller youth dance companies, but as I said, they're more kind of rep-based rather than built on developing the young person's creativity at the heart. So, yeah and as I said, in countries like India and Africa, there's very small pockets of things going on, but there's they're very hard to find. So, yeah, the UK, England we have a good connection with One Dance UK and the work they're doing there in youth dance and then Australia. So, if there's anybody listening who works in Canada, we would like to develop more relationships in Canada and other countries, but it's very hard to build these international relationships without sometimes meeting. Luckily, the Commonwealth Youth Dance Festival gave us a lot of connections and we have used those connections, but the countries that weren’t represented we have found it challenging to try and find a similar ethos.
Patricia:
What excites you in the world of dance at the moment?
Anna Kenrick: [23:29]
Well, the last piece I went to see was Jasmin Vardimon’s Medusa. I don't know if, did she tour in Australia? She's an Israeli choreographer and her latest piece, Medusa, was looking at female politics, which was really exciting. I have for many years, but particularly now, I do enjoy going to see work that makes me think about the world I live in and questions and challenges the infrastructure, the political or economic infrastructure and challenges me as an audience member. I enjoy going to see dance where I can sit as an audience member and let it wash over me, but I do like to be challenged in my thinking when I go and see contemporary dance and this piece did. Really highlighted, you know, some of the politics, female politics, that are happening globally. I could feel some of the audience were quite uncomfortable with that and that interests me, that interests me – ah - why people go and see dance, what people expect when they go and see dance and why and it was quite interesting listen to the conversations in the audience after. I suppose if you don't know Jasmin Vardimons work, you might be in for a little shock. So that excites me, and what else excites me, the Scottish Dance Theatre excites me, there’s quite a lot of changing of people and fabulous choreographer and man, Joan Clevillé, has just taken over Scottish Dance Theatre, which is pretty exciting in the Scottish dance sector. So, I'm really excited to see what happens up there and how he takes the company forward from now. And also Yeah, Scottish Ballet, they've been doing some really exciting film work at the moment. Dance in film is not something I've ever done a lot of in my career, and it's maybe an area I'm going to look into over the next few years, because obviously, the world we live in; dance film can be seen by many more than the live product. So it's something I'm looking into and they've actually just worked on a couple of dance films for their digital season, which are very funny and very, very exciting. So, yeah, they've caught my eye as well.
Patricia: [26:00]
What do you want to see more of in dance?
Anna Kenrick: [26:04]
I want to see more - slightly off point – but I employee choreographers in the summer to work with our Project Y and I struggled to find female choreographers. So, I want to see more female choreographers, making work that jumps out at me - jumps out and connects, there's just less women, for the reasons we know. So, I want to see more of that. I'm very excited at the moment to see some of our ex-National Youth Dance Company members becoming professional. So some of the people I worked with three or four years ago are now in their early 20s and out in London, and in Scotland, making work and I'm very excited to see what they can offer this sector and what they're doing because they're very focused young people, and they had great training and also did National and every other opportunity they could, and I know they're out there making work. I'm really interested to see and maybe connect with them. Some of them are applying to approach me now to see about work as well, so I'm very excited to see where they go.
Patricia:
Wonderful. What's lined up for you and Y Dance and maybe even National, like, what are you doing in the future?
Anna Kenrick: [27:35]
What are we doing? Just for those who don't know, we work across three areas; we work across participation, talent development and education. We have a very exciting project in education, we've got another 18 months of that, so I'm quite excited to see what the evaluation comes out at. That is a four-year project where we're teaching the curriculum in Scottish schools through dance. So teaching finger-spacing and the history of the Clyde ship-builders and numeracy and literacy and history, all through dance. So I'm really excited to see where that goes and we're also trying to now look at whether we can get more money to keep that project going. We're trying to get getting in touch with government to see because obviously, it's linked to attainment for those children who may be struggling in traditional classroom methods ability to go in and learn through a different medium. We're looking at developing that and we're developing our work in participation with vulnerable young people. So as I mentioned before, we work with teenage mums and dads, we also work in Polmont Prison. We’re at the moment developing more larger scale projects, working with more vulnerable young people who may have been excluded from school or in safe centres. So that kind of, we're very drawn and passionate about work in social justice at the moment and what impact we can have on that front. And then with National, we've got two performances left and then we get the new company in September, which is always very exciting. This year, we’ve also got hot house, which is our young choreographers course with Scottish Ballet. We're getting that back, that's been quiet for about year, so we're starting that again. I'm trying to look at developing young choreographers across Scotland, so that's exciting. And Project Y starts next week, two weeks, when I come to Australia so really excited to see what the choreographers create with our young people across the Summer, when I'm in Oz, when I get back to see it all on the stage. So yeah, there's lots going on.
Patricia: [30:06]
Yeah, Just to kind of wrap it up, we’ll bring it back to the start. So, if you had the opportunity, what would you say to your 18-year-old self?
Anna Kenrick: [30:19]
What would I say to myself? That there's many paths in dance, and the dance is a far bigger sector than sometimes at college, you're led to believe that you know, being a performer on stage is the only way you can work in dance. And that things will work out that, that you will find the path that you're meant to and to be happy.
Patricia: [30:45]
Thank you so much for talking with me. It's been a pleasure. Inspiring As always,
Anna Kenrick:
Thank you.
