Sites of significance: connecting dance practitioners and places for dance across territorial borders in rural regions

Funded by an award from Cavan County Council/Creative Ireland and in collaboration with Fermanagh and Omagh District Council and the UNESCO Global Geopark, this cross-border project aims to gain understanding of the pathways to engagement and work in dance that dance artists and facilitators who live and/or work within territorial border areas experience. This project builds on the previous research experience of the Co-PIs Aoife McGrath (QUB) and Victoria Durrer (UCD) and draws on findings from a number of collaborative projects supported by Shared Island Initiative, Irish Research Council, Dance Ireland, Theatre and Dance NI, the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sports and Media, and the HEA North South Programme, as well as their own individual experiences in dance and cultural policy.

Understanding the pathways to engagement and work in dance within territorial border areas requires recognition of border areas themselves as embodied spaces that exist within, across, and beyond territorial boundaries. Taking inspiration from the underground rivers of the UNESCO Global Geopark that traverse the territorial borders of Ireland and Northern Ireland, Cavan and Fermanagh, the (often) invisible pathways to dance and connections between people and places will be charted through movement and serve as material for choreographic and dialogic exploration and exchange.