The Dark Room Presents: Audio Description as an Art Form

Hosted by Movement Research, Dark Room Ballet is designed specifically for the educational needs of blind and visually impaired adults.

Dark Room Ballet Series is offered at no cost.

No class on November 26 and December 3rd.

Dark Room Ballet presents:
Audio Description as an Art Form

This Workshop is offered online via Zoom.

To register email [email protected]

Workshop Description

This series of workshops explore audio description for dance as an art form of its own.These workshops are suitable for all people, from those with no prior knowledge of audio description all the way to working professional audio describers. Each workshop can be experienced as a standalone class, or students may choose to register for the series. Like all workshops and classes in the Dark Room, these workshops are designed specifically for the educational needs of blind and visually impaired people, and priority is given to blind and visually impaired students for registration.

• Saturday, November 5th, 4 PM New York Time
  The Layered Body: Self-Audio Description that De-Centers Sight

Audio description for dance has, for too long, stayed deliberately superficial and visual in its descriptions of movement performance. In this workshop, participants will cultivate the somatic skills and body awareness to describe how the body feels in movement, rather than how it looks, de-centering sight and rooting itself in visceral language.

• Saturday, November 12th, 4 PM New York Time
  Your Memory is Real: Creating Memory-Based Self-Audio Described Dance

This is a Blind Art workshop, where participants are given the tools, coaching, and safe space to develop memory-based self-audio described movement performances for one another. Learn how to move and speak simultaneously, and welcome others into your authentic memory space.

• Saturday, November 19th, 4 PM New York Time
  How it Feels: Integrating Physical Sensation and Emotion in Self-Audio Description

Emotional content is often deliberately excluded from audio description for dance. In this workshop, participants will cultivate a self-audio description practice that can help fully integrate the description of physical movement and the accompanying emotional experience.

• Saturday, December 10th, 4 PM New York Time
  Forming Effective Audio Description Partnerships Between Dancers and Describers

Audio describers can create their best art when they can form real partnerships with dancers that have self-audio description skills. Whether you are a dancer who wants to hone your self-audio description skills or an audio describer who wants to learn the questions to ask when developing descriptions (and what to do with the answers), this crucial teamwork will be cultivated here.

• Saturday, December 17th, 4 PM New York Time
  Audio Description for Traditional Ballet Performances

Using the framing device of Act 1, Scene 1 from Giselle, participants will develop a different set of expectations for audio described traditional ballet performances, and will co-create a manifesto for ballet audio description for wide-spread dissemination among traditional arts presenters.

Accessibility note:

This workshop includes auditive guidance.

This workshop includes readings.

For access requests, please contact [email protected], subject line “Dark Room Ballet, Audio Description as an Art Form.”

[ID: Image description: Krishna, a thin, pale skinned woman with long dark hair pulled into a braid, poses on a studio stage. She is wearing a simple white dress with her shoulders exposed and a fluffy white headdress perched on her forehead and wrapping down her braid. She looks over her left shoulder as she lightly holds a straight cane between her hands and points her left foot behind her. Photo Credit: Krishna Washburn & Micaela Mamede]