Here is a selection of nine videos gleaned here and there to present to you the riches and varieties of dance around the world, whether by major international ballet troupes, cinema, documentary films and video clips. This selection is obviously not exhaustive as there is still more to show.
- The Evolution of Dance by Ricardo Walker and his troupe presents the evolution of dance from the 1950s to 2019 through 35 different dance styles, which has enjoyed immense success on the web.
- ALL DANCE STYLES: Sixty different styles and types of dance from around the world.
- The dazzling diversity of African dance in fourteen movements presented by Chinyanta Kabaso. “If African culture were a tree, then dance would be its flowers,” says the choreographer and TED Idea Search winner. In her captivating presentation of traditional and modern dances, she highlights the beauty of the movements and explains how they reveal the history of migration and cultural connections shared between different ethnic groups across the African continent.
- Ravel’s “Boléro” choreographed by Maurice Béjart, danced by the legendary Jorge Donn in 1979 and in the famous final scene of the film “Les uns et les autres” by Claude Lelouch in 1981.
- “Then Comes the Body” is a short documentary about outsiders, globalism and dance. With no ballet school in Nigeria, the main character opens the Leap of Dance Academy in his backyard: humble, rigorous and free for any dedicated person.
- Ailey, many know the name Alvin Ailey as a choreographer, but how many know the man? Ailey’s commitment to truth-seeking in movement resulted in pioneering and enduring choreography centered on African American experiences. Director Jamila Wignot’s resounding biography offers astute access to the elusive visionary who founded one of the world’s most renowned dance companies, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
- “Somebody That I Used To Know” by Gotye from the 2010s which combines contemporary dance and fashion. More than a decade after its release, the CDK Company (a collective based in the Netherlands) revisited the hit by choreographing a dance performance just as iconic as the original clip, heavily stylized as if from a Wes Anderson film.
- At the Semperoper in Germany and at the École des Sables near Dakar, young dancers, guided by former members of Pina Bausch’s Tanztheater, revisit her legendary choreographies. For these artists, from contemporary dance, hip hop or classical ballet, Dancing Pina means questioning one’s limits, one’s desires, and transforming a work while allowing oneself to be transformed by it.
- The dancer and choreographer Sadeck Waff, made famous by his work “Murmuration”, a piece for the handover between the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2020 and those in Paris in 2024. From art and rhythm, to the strength of the arms and geometry, with 126 dancers, including 19 with disabilities, leading the artists’ arms to form the word Paris and the date 2024.
Selection by Christine Cibert.
