By Dr. Kathryn Stamp, We Are Epic Advisory Board Member
In March 2025, I spent just under two weeks in Bali as part of a research trip supporting the Inclusive Dance in Bali workshop. Hosted by We Are Epic and attended by local dance artists and community organisations, the programme was a rare and generative meeting point. A space where multiple languages, dance traditions, and lived experiences converged.
The richness of this experience continues to sit with me. From supporting the documentation process to co-facilitating a knowledge café session, I witnessed firsthand how inclusive dance can offer a radically open space for shared learning.
Participants came with diverse experiences, wheelchair users, deaf dancers, community organisers, artists, and what struck me most was the way dance became a shared language across all forms of difference. Despite initial trepidation at the reality of moving with strangers, walls were broken down through excellent sessions led by Arif Onelegz , Laura Evans, Nalitari and Katie Goad. And the room became alive with curiosity, generosity, and respect.
These moments weren’t just heartening, they were instructive. They reminded me of what inclusive dance can be at its best: not a tick box, but a method of being together, of co-creating new cultural possibilities.
Inclusive Dance in Cultural Context
Bali’s relationship with dance is deeply embedded in ritual, ceremony, and community identity. Movement here is not only artistic expression, it’s a living form of cultural transmission. Against this backdrop, the inclusion of disabled dancers raises important questions.
Who is permitted to carry tradition?
How are authenticity and legitimacy defined within communal heritage?
In many ways, the Inclusive Dance in Bali workshop was a quiet, radical intervention. Participants weren’t just ‘being included’ in existing forms, they were reshaping them.
The workshop challenged entrenched ideas about ability and value, addressing who gets to move, and how that movement might be visible.
In the UK, inclusive dance is increasingly recognised as a professional practice. Companies like Candoco, Stopgap, Magpie and others have developed integrated performance and training models. Yet structural barriers persist. The recently published Barriers to Progression & Employment in Dance for Disabled People report highlights stark disparities in access to training, funding, and leadership roles. Disabled dancers often find themselves siloed in participatory contexts with limited routes to sustained employment or progression into mainstream or professional spheres.
Bali presents a different set of conditions. Inclusive dance here is often rooted in grassroots community work, and while professional structures are less formalised, the practice is deeply social. That creates both challenges and opportunities.
On one hand, limited infrastructure and state support mean access is precarious and retention is a challenge. On the other, the communal nature of dance-making can foster a more fluid, adaptive, and culturally embedded approach to inclusion.
Knowledge Café: Shared Aspirations, Shared Futures
The final session of the workshop was the Knowledge Café, a lightly structured yet open session where participants reflected on hopes, barriers, and future actions for inclusive dance in Bali.
As a facilitator, my role was to listen closely and help shape space for collective thought. Several key themes emerged:
- Desire for Visibility: participants wanted to be seen, not just as a niche practice, but as something that belongs in schools, public spaces, and mainstream cultural life.
- Community and Collaboration: there was a strong emphasis on the power of working across difference. Participants recognised that their strength lay in unity, envisioning artists supporting one another, sharing tools and co-creating across disability, geography, and genres.
- Structural Barriers: many spoke of misunderstanding, lack of accessible facilities, and limited government support. These barriers are shared across multiple contexts.
What was particularly powerful was seeing the enthusiasm and how this workshop felt like a catalyst for action. There was a tangible sense that this wasn’t the end of a project, but the start of a movement.
Organisational Visits
Alongside the workshop, we visited two organisations: Cahaya Mutiara Ubud and Anak Unik. Both are deeply embedded in their communities and provide spaces for disabled people to engage in creative, educational, and social activities.
At Cahaya Mutiara, I was taken by how artmaking was woven into everyday life. Dance, craft, and expression were not separate from collective care, but integral to it.
At Anak Unik, we discussed ways in which creative practice can support inclusive education and long-term wellbeing.
These visits helped me understand the broader ecology in which inclusive dance in Bali is situated. It is part of a wider movement for disability rights, community development, and cultural transformation. It is also deeply relational, being built on trust, long-term engagement, and mutual care.
Bridging Worlds: What We Can Learn
Spending time in Bali made me reflect on how easily Western frameworks of inclusion can impose themselves in international contexts, often with good intentions, but without enough attention to local realities.
At We Are Epic, we’re acutely aware of this tension. During the trip, I worked with co-founders Ant and Laura to begin exploring what a future for inclusive practice in Bali and beyond might look like, one that respects cultural specificity, prioritises local leadership, and sees collaboration as a two-way exchange.
What we encountered in Bali was not a replication of UK models, but something distinct and powerful. Dance wasn’t being made accessible by reducing complexity, it was being transformed through shared authorship. Disabled dancers weren’t simply being invited in, they were shaping what the work could be.
And it is important to think about what learning from the UK context might be useful, without imposing it from above. The UK’s experience of developing inclusive dance as a recognised professional pathway, despite its limitations, could provide useful frameworks for sustainable funding, network-building, and policy advocacy.
The key is to approach these conversations with humility and openness, always led by the needs and voices of local communities.
Final Thoughts
As I write this, I’m thinking of a moment from the workshop, a group of dancers improvising together, some standing, some seated, others signing or translating. The air was thick with connection. It didn’t matter that we didn’t all speak the same language. The dance held us.
Inclusive dance is often framed in terms of what it offers to disabled people. But what struck me in Bali is how much it offers to all of us.
A different way of listening. A deeper understanding of collaboration. A reminder that our bodies, in all their complexity, are capable of extraordinary expression and connection with others.
As We Are Epic begins to imagine new futures in Asia, I carry this experience with me, not as a finished chapter, but as an open question. How do we continue to make space for inclusive dance to thrive locally, ethically, and together?
Thanks to Coventry University for funding this project.