Bringing Hard-to-Voice Experiences into Society Through Performance
Interviewees: Alison Ferrao (Artistic Director), Ella Fleetwood (Dance Facilitator), Amy Lovelock (Dance Facilitator), Magpie Dancers
Date: February 27, 2026
At Magpie Dance, the dancers’ own voices and lived experiences are treated not merely as source material, but as the central core of the work itself. This does not simply mean “expressing oneself.” Rather, experiences of self and family, treatment received within society, and awareness of those whose voices are harder to hear are transformed—through research, dialogue, improvisation, and choreography—into performances that can reach an audience.
Here, voice is not limited to spoken language. Movement, facial expression, distance, touch, walking, memories of anxiety, and anger are all treated as forms of voice. Creating a space where that voice can safely emerge, and then weaving it into a form that can be read as performance, lies at the center of Magpie Dance’s creative practice.
Having a Voice — Holding Space Even for Those Whose Voices Are Harder to Hear
At the beginning of the interview, discussion turned to one of the company’s previous works. When a Magpie Dance facilitator asked the dancers what the piece had been about, and how it had been created, the dancers reflected on it as a heavy and difficult subject. They began to describe how it addressed the realities of autistic people being pushed away from society, or living in ways where having a voice can be difficult.
“Some autistic people are pushed away from society, and it can be hard for them to go outside.
It can also be hard to use their voice.
But I think they should be able to be outside more, and I don’t think they should be pushed away from the world.”
As part of the making of that work, interviews with autistic individuals became part of the research process. People spoke of feeling trapped or made invisible. During this interview, the dancers returned to that research while also connecting it to the experiences of siblings and people close to them, each describing in their own words what the work had attempted to hold.
How could the realities of autistic people being excluded from society, or struggling to have a voice, be communicated to an audience through performance? One especially striking aspect was that before the performance itself, the dancers were given time to explain directly to the audience what the work was about. At the center of that explanation was the theme of having a voice.
“Some people have a voice, and some people find it harder to have one.
We have a voice. But there are people in care homes who don’t have a voice, and they need help.”
Here, voice does not simply mean speaking or not speaking. It is connected to being seen, being heard, and having one’s existence reach others. Magpie Dance values the voices of its own dancers, while also holding space for the existence of others whose voices may be even harder to hear. That is where the social dimension of its work becomes especially visible.
Transforming Experience into a Physical Vocabulary
Magpie Dance’s creative process does not begin with a theme imposed from above and translated into choreography. Instead, work gradually emerges through dialogue and research.
In one of the current projects, questions drawn from a question box became starting points for sharing everyday experiences and moments of discomfort.
One example was the frustration of being treated like a child. When one dancer shared this feeling, others immediately responded that they had experienced the same. Through improvisation, this became part of the material of the work.
“When someone said, ‘I didn’t like being treated like a child,’ other people said, ‘That happens to me too.’
From there, we improvised what we would do in those situations.
All the creative choices and movements you saw today came from their improvisation.”
Another memorable example involved a bus scene: strangers approaching too closely, conflict between someone and the driver, and the fear that could arise from such situations.
“If someone unknown does something to me on the bus, I move toward the front.
It’s to stay safe. When things like that happen, it makes me feel uncomfortable.”
These materials are not left as personal testimony alone. They are transformed into scenes that reach an audience through movement, voice, recorded sound, facial expression, touch, and shifting distance.
When asked how personal voice and ideas become physical vocabulary and choreography, one dancer responded:
“It’s important not only to communicate voice, but emotion.
By bringing out our perspectives and feelings, we can give audiences something to think about.
We want audiences to think about how the world could become kinder to people.”
Creation does not end with speaking about experience. It includes thinking about how experience is embodied and passed to an audience. The strength of Magpie Dance’s work lies in the fact that its source material begins in the dancers’ own experiences and emotional lives, and that those origins remain visible on stage.
Practices of Safety and Dignity as the Foundation for Speaking
Another important observation was that practices around safety, dignity, and boundaries were not placed outside the creative process.
The Magpie Dance team explained that, particularly in older groups, discussing individual boundaries, talking openly about what happens when those boundaries are crossed, ensuring volunteers are present in each room, and confirming safeguarding policies are all treated as basic assumptions.
This is more than risk management. When asked whether it seemed that dancers themselves were actively shaping boundaries and safety, one dancer replied simply:
“That’s part of having a voice.”
At Magpie Dance, practices of safety and dignity are not systems of control. They are conditions for voice. If dancers are creating work from experiences of personal struggle, family difficulty, harmful treatment, fear, or anger, then boundaries and safety become essential.
The facilitators also spoke about how maintaining a safe space requires communication that responds to each individual.
“To hold a safe space, it’s very important how a facilitator stands in the room, and how they respond.
Everyone is different, so what is needed in each moment changes how we speak, or how close we stand.
Because we have worked together for a long time, we know when we can push a little further, and when we need to pull back.”
Safety does not restrict creative freedom. Rather, it creates the conditions in which people can speak, approach, step away, and remain in relationship while shaping work together. This foundation also protects the work from being too easily reduced to emotional testimony alone.
Listening, Testing, and Editing into Performance
Magpie Dance’s creative practice values dancers’ voices, but it does not stop at simply collecting and presenting them.
Facilitators enter sessions with plans, while also remaining flexible enough to shift direction depending on the dancers’ condition or interests on that day.
“We have a lesson plan. But we also need to be ready to completely ignore it.
Because dancers may want to do something different.”
This flexibility does not mean abandoning artistic judgment. As work moves toward performance, ideas are tested, refined, and selected.
“When there are lots of ideas, we try everything. If it works, we keep it. If it doesn’t, we take it out.
There’s a balance.”
What happens here is the coexistence of listening and editing. Material that emerges from dancers is explored together by dancers and facilitators, then tested, reconsidered, and shaped into something that can function as performance. That process itself becomes part of Magpie Dance’s artistic practice.
■ Research Notes
What distinguishes Magpie Dance is that it does not separate listening to voice from editing voice into performance.
Attending to those whose voices are harder to hear. Transforming everyday anxiety and discomfort into physical vocabulary. Holding safety and dignity as the foundation for speaking. All of these are deeply connected to the social dimension of the work.
In Japan as well, the phrase “valuing the voices of those directly concerned” is often used. But the deeper question may be how that voice is supported until it becomes performance, and to whom—and in what form—it is delivered.
Magpie Dance does not separate listening from editing. In that, it offers a practical model for how voice can be carried into society through artistic work.