‘If the choreography is incredibly poetic, so is the audio description’ … a scene from Lived Fiction by Stopgap. Photograph: Christopher Parkes
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‘If the choreography is incredibly poetic, so is the audio description’ … a scene from Lived Fiction by Stopgap. Photograph: Christopher Parkes
Dance
The art of audio description can turn dance into a moving experience for all
Caroline Butterwick
Stopgap’s revelatory stage production Lived Fiction is committed to opening up dance for the whole audience
Sun 3 Nov 2024 13.00 ESTLast modified on Sun 3 Nov 2024 13.04 EST
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Six dancers glide across the stage at the Lowry in Salford. As a visually impaired person, I would expect to feel lost watching dance but I know how they link arms and roll their shoulders, how the light captures their sepia costumes. This is Lived Fiction, an inclusive contemporary dance work by Stopgap, with audio description as a key part of the performance.
I enjoy audio-described theatre, but was unsure how it would work for dance, which, to me, seems so inherently visual.
Lily Norton, the show’s access artist and co-writer, is on stage throughout. In a contrast to the traditional form of audio description, I’m not having to fiddle awkwardly with [...]