Dance Reflections Festival 2025 Workshops
Dance Reflections by Van Cleef & Arpels Festival
Dance Reflections by Van Cleef & Arpels in collaboration with Sadler’s Wells, have organised a series of workshops for professional and non-professional dancers.
The workshops allow for diving deeper into the works and techniques with the artists featured in the Festival.
True to its values of transmission and education, Dance Reflections enriches the programming of its London Festival with choreographic workshops involving all its partners
Open to everyone – amateurs and professionals – these workshops offer the a lively and immersive look into the world of contemporary dance. During these moments, choreographers and performers become educators, relaying their artistic vocabulary and excerpts from their repertoires to participants. These workshops aim both to foster exchanges between the dance community and the audience and to allow the latter to understand this universe through experience.
We encourage participants to share any access information that might be useful for the team to know ahead of these workshops. We can put a range of things in place to best support your participation. Please contact learning@sadlerswells.com with your specific requirements and feel free to include any access riders.
Header image © Thierry Hauswald
Workshops
Early works with Jennifer Payán (Trisha Brown Dance Company)
Monday 10 March, 3 pm – 5 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
Focusing on Trisha Brown’s Early Works (1966-1979), this class explores Brown’s task based and mathematical structures. Students tune their bodies through pedestrian movement while exploring atypical orientations to space, architecture and gravity. The company embraces the ordinary and reveal the humanity of the performer through simple tasks and gesture.
The workshop is taught by Jennifer Payán, dancer of the Trisha Brown Dance Company
This workshop is for non-professional dancers, aged 18+.
Playground with Kerem Gelebek
Tuesday 11 March, 1 pm – 3 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
Kerem Gelebek’s workshop focuses connection and contact between the body and the space, while always relating to play. Kerem Gebelek is the soloist of Sakinan göze çöp batar by Christian Rizzo.
This workshop is for non-professional dancers, aged 18+.
Culture Club x Ballet National de Marseille
Tuesday 11 March, 2pm – 3pm
The Dance Floor at Sadler’s Wells East
Free
Sadler’s Wells Culture Club encourages you to discover new passions (or develop existing ones) through dance and the performing arts. This Culture Club, led by a dancer from Ballet National de Marseille, will explore a TikTok Jazz sequence. This workshop is for all and takes place in two parts, with a first warm-up, then leading into a transmission of the TikTok Jazz sequence from Age of Content.
To find out more on how to book your spot email learning@sadlerswells.com
This workshop is for everyone.
Trisha Brown Repertory with Burr Johnson
Thursday 13 March, 10 am – 12 pm (noon)
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
This workshop facilitated by Burr Johnson is a deep exploration of Trisha Brown’s kinetic universe and compositional mind. With a sharp focus on detail and a wild celebration of movement, participants experience the vast range of dynamic within Trisha’s Brown’s work and discover their own curiosities within.
The workshop is taught by Burr Johnson, dancer of the Trisha Brown Dance Company
This workshop is for professional dancers, aged 18+.
Connection with Christian Rizzo
Thursday 13 March, 1 pm – 3 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
Through this encounter, Christian Rizzo attempts to make the singular and the common resonate as a single movement. The workshop observes the elasticity and tension between bodies and space to highlight the point of balance between abstraction and daily gestures.
This workshop is for professional dancers, aged 18+.
Age of Content Repertory with dancers from Ballet National de Marseille
Saturday 15 March, 1 pm – 2:30 pm
Studio 2, Sadler’s Wells East
Free
Age of Content seeks to question our relationship to the abundance of content and simultaneous realities that characterize the contemporary world. Like the digital practices that have established themselves in the contemporary choreographic landscape, the viral challenges on TikTok have aroused an immediate fascination, redefining the way in which aesthetics, movements and choreographic cultures propagate. These platforms have opened up a new space where influences intersect and metamorphose, giving rise to unexpected fusions.
On stage, these fragments of movements enter into dialogue with the choreographic space, where elements of jazz dance and musicals intertwine to create a fluid and harmonious synergy, reinventing the very notion of the collective.
The workshop takes place in two parts, with a first warm-up period led by the dancer who adapts to the level of the group. Then a second part of transmission of the TikTok Jazz sequence in a group.
This workshop is for non-professional dancers, aged 18+.
Drawing & Movement with Jules Cunningham
Monday 17 March, 4:30 pm – 6 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
Join dance artist Jules Cunningham for a workshop that explores elements of creating movement and drawing, in response to music and rhythm. The workshop is based on Pigeons, a performance work which is danced to and inspired by the composition Gay Guerrilla by Julius Eastman.
No experience in either dance or drawings is necessary! Materials will be provided. The session will be relaxed and inclusive.
This workshop is for non-professional dancers, aged 18+.
Movement & Connection with Soa Ratsifandrihana for professional dancers
Tuesday 18 March, 10:30 am – 12:30 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
Soa Ratsifandrihana, a French-Malagasy dancer and choreographer, is offering a workshop centered around movement and connection, she invites participants to explore intimate movement in all its broadest forms. Through dance exercises, games, and storytelling, Soa guides each person to connect with their body and their own rhythm, fostering both individual and collective expression. This workshop is for professional dancers to discover new ways of sharing stories.
This workshop is for professional dancers, aged 18+.
Movement & Connection with Soa Ratsifandrihana for non-professional dancers
Tuesday 18 March, 4 pm – 5:30 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
Soa Ratsifandrihana, a French-Malagasy dancer and choreographer, is offering a workshop centered around movement and connection, she invites participants to explore intimate movement in all its broadest forms. Through dance exercises, games, and storytelling, Soa guides each person to connect with their body and their own rhythm, fostering both individual and collective expression. This workshop is an opportunity for everyone, regardless of their level or experience, to discover new ways of sharing stories.
This workshop is for non-professional dancers, aged 18+.
Cunningham techniques with Cédric Andrieux (Lyon Opera Ballet)
Wednesday 19 March, 4 pm – 5:15 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
As part of the Lyon Opera Ballet’s visit to London with the Cunningham Forever program, the company is offering a chance for people to discover the highly specific technique developed by Merce Cunningham over more than 50 years, which enabled him to create more than a hundred dances.
This class for non-professionals will be taught by Cédric Andrieux, Ballet Director and long-time member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company.
For professional dancers, see the workshop offered by Raul Serrano Nunez on Thursday 20 March.
This workshop is for non-professional dancers, aged 18+.
Cunningham techniques with Raul Serrano Nunez (Lyon Opera Ballet)
Thursday 20 March, 11 am – 12:15 pm
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
As part of the Lyon Opera Ballet’s visit to London with the Cunningham Forever program, the company is offering a chance for people to discover the highly specific technique developed by Merce Cunningham over more than 50 years, which enabled him to create more than a hundred dances.
The class for professionals will be taught by Raul Serrano Nuñez, Ballet Master of the Ballet de Lyon, who has had extensive experience of Merce Cunningham’s work during his more than 10- year career with the Ballet.
“Cunningham Technique is a rigorous form of training designed to create strength and flexibility of both the body and the mind.” Merce Cunningham
For non-professional dancers, see the workshop offered by Cédric Andrieux on Wednesday 19 March.
This workshop is for professional dancers, aged 18+.
Composition with Georges Labbat
Wednesday 26 March, 10 am – 12 pm (noon)
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
In this 2-hour workshop, Georges Labbat explores with participants a series of improvisation exercises designed to introduce the principles of choreographic composition that he uses in his work. Centered around the use of time and space, we focus on these foundations to approach choreographic creation.
This workshop is for professional dancers, aged 18+.
Improvisation & Choreography inspired by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui with Endre Schumicky (Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève)
Thursday 27 March, 10 am – 12 pm (noon)
Studio C at Sadler’s Wells Angel
Free
The workshop starts with improvisation to let go of the chatter of the mind and to sink into bodies. It focuses on fluidity, dynamics and definition. The topic is the fine line between intensity and being effortless.
Endre Schumicky, the leader of the workshop, shares his enthusiasm: “I look forward to sharing the space with you!”
This workshop is for professional dancers, aged 18+.