Dance City has joined forces with the Discovery Museum this Autumn to expand our offer of free space to North East dance artists and support them to continue to create work safely during the ongoing pandemic.

We recognise that the strain on our building’s capacity has compromised the availability of free studio space that is vital to many artists working in the region. We hope that expanding our remit to spaces outside our landmark Newcastle and Sunderland buildings will go some way to remedy this.

Dance City’s resident artists will now be able to utilise The Discovery Museum’s stunning Great Hall, one of the city’s finest venues. Prior to lockdown it was regularly used for a host of different celebrations and events including weddings, conferences and formal dinners.

Tucked into the rafters of the historic city centre museum, the Great Hall is renowned for its beautiful art deco-style ceiling and large capacity, making it both an inspiring and safe venue for dancers to work in whist maintaining social distancing.

Nick Butterly, Customer and Facilities Manager at Discovery Museum said: “We’re very happy to be able to support our cultural neighbours Dance City as well as hosting the first artist’s residency in the magnificent Great Hall. Abundant space for people to socially distance and Discovery Museum’s stringent sanitation measures means artists can feel safe and focus on their work. Although we’ve had to make a few changes to how things work here, we’re delighted to be open for visitors too, and that we’re able to keep finding new ways for people to use the museum.”

Artist Adam Russell and his company (pictured) were the first to be in residency in the Great Hall this week for the development of his latest work ‘Love Dances’ that was awarded a bursary by Dance City via their online SOUP platform event earlier this year. Eliot Smith Dance and Patrick Ziza will follow suit in the coming weeks.

We look forward to working with the Discovery Museum over the next two months and seeing some of the wonderful work that the Great Hall has helped to facilitate.

Pictured: Sarah Golding, Peter Pearson and Alys North of Adam Russell Dance.