The Royal Ballet is set to premiere a new work on World Ballet Day, 12 November, in collaboration with blind artist Devon Healey. The performance will feature immersive descriptive audio woven into the music, designed to explore how blindness can redefine the experience of dance for all audience members.
Healey, an assistant professor of disability studies at the University of Toronto, is working with choreographers including Sir Wayne McGregor, Tiler Peck, Bim Malcomson, and Rebecca Myles Stewart, as well as composer Max Richter. The piece aims to show how blindness and disability can offer alternative forms of perception.
The production includes a duet between Royal Ballet dancer Leo Dixon and Takashi Kikuchi, an amateur dancer who has been visually impaired since birth. Kikuchi's personal story of navigating home by feeling the sun's warmth inspired the choreography, with Dixon embodying the 'warm breath of the sun'.
Healey described the audio descriptions as 'a collaboration of the senses guided by blindness', aiming to convey what dancers experience in their bodies beyond sight. She hopes audiences will leave feeling dance in a different way, appreciating the unseen aspects of movement.
Robert Binet, the curator, noted that the commission pushes the concept of accessibility further by considering how disabled perspectives can shape the art form. The Royal Ballet's director, Kevin O'Hare, emphasised the company's focus on 'radical accessibility'.
