Midan: Amman Dance Lab
a figurative meeting ground for dance in Amman
Ongoing Programs
Midan provides consistent opportunities for Amman's dancers to train, perform, experiment and connect. Midan is in residency at Jordan National Gallery of Fine Arts, where it organizes "Midan– Dance Performance", a monthly performance event, as well as dance classes, ChoreoLab, and dance/music improvisation jams.
Movement Classes
Weekly dance classes are usually held by Midan director Ryuji Yamaguchi, while at times they are taught by will be held by local and international dance artists. Dance communities are built through moving bodies together in space. These clsses will provide dancers important skills while building common ground within the dance community. All workshops include Arabic/English interpreters and a sliding-scale fee.
Midan: Amman Dance Lab has hosted dance workshops under various names since 2017, including an online series during the COVID-19 pandemic. Past workshop leaders included Yoshiko Chuma (USA/Japan), Ariane Bernier (Canada), Mario Vircha (Costa Rica), Rita Gobi (Hungary), Rashmi Yeolekar (India), Imran Syafiq (Malaysia), Mark Wong (Bermuda), along with many talented local artists such as Talin Haribidyan, Sara Alamad, and Cynthia Tokajian.
Dance and Music Improvisation (DMI)
Dance & Music Improvisation (DMI) is a monthly improvisation session of dancers and musicians that rigorously investigates improvisation as an artistic process. The sessions are held in collaboration with music group Saowah. What is a ‘successful’ improvisation? How does a group of artists improvise together when they come from different backgrounds? How can DMI be both a meeting ground for experienced artists and a starting point for new collaborations? Each month, artists will engage in a different approach for improvisation, with the sessions taking the form of a workshop, rehearsal, or a much more fluid “jam” depending on the month. Their investigations will culminate in a public performance.
ChoreoLab
ChoreoLab provides a monthly opportunity for artists to show work-in-progress danceworks of any genre for audience feedback. Up to four 5-minute danceworks will be shown in the monthly event. Feedback sessions will be moderated in Arabic, with English translation, using Critical Response Process, an artist-centered methodology for audience feedback developed by Liz Lerman. This process allows the artists to receive feedback that is useful for their danceworks to grow even further. ChoreoLab develops the dance community’s capacity to talk about dance–and in Arabic–and for artists of different genres to interact and watch each other’s works. ChoreoLab will also provide rehearsal space, choreography workshops, and mentorship to support artist development.
