image credits: Europe Beyond Access_Fine Lines_Roser López Espinosa_photo by Tilo Stengel

Europe Beyond Access is the biggest trans-national project in the world supporting disabled and Deaf artists to mainstream disability on and off stage.

Presentation

Current Co-productions

Four innovative projects led by artists with disabilities rooted in dance, choreography, and movement have been awarded co-production support and the opportunity to showcase across the Europe Beyond Access network:

STARTING WITH THE LIMBS draws on the experiences of artists using prosthetics or mobility devices to create scenographic elements which blur body and landscape, generate & amplify movement possibilities. A new cross-disciplinary, international collaboration between choreographer Annie Hanauer and l'Autre Maison.

HORN FUCKERS, by Diana Niepce, thinks of the body as an extraordinary event. In a post-apocalyptic universe, the piece based on the chaos theory works on loneliness and exposes the body in a state of contemplation and defies the viewer to reconsider conventions and social norms.

LAYERS, by Katarzyna Żeglicka, is a project of radical imagination, hope, and utopian reality, rooted in anarchy understood as the building of community and love. It’s a story about emancipated women fighting against oppression; about dreams and visions of transforming the world, grounded in a feminist-queer genealogy.

In AD Orchestra (Audio Description Orchestra), Sindri Runudde explores visual interpretation as a medium for creating dance and live performances. Together with sound designer Dehendrik Lechat Willekens, they will dive into a landscape of words and description practices, questioning how we can listen to dance and hear movements. Let's awaken the soul within visual interpretation.

Europe Beyond Access: Key Milestones

Artistic Exchanges

Exchange between European artists is at the heart of Europe Beyond Access, aiming to support artistic innovation, counter geographic and artistic isolation of disabled artists, and build transnational professional relationships through programmes such as Artistic Laboratories, Solo Residencies for skills transfer from mid-career to early-career disabled artists, Group Residencies for transnational artistic collaboration between peers, and a Digital Exchange programme.

Audience Development and Engagement

Europe Beyond Access is committed to developing audiences for the work of disabled artists by sharing the quality and innovation of Europe’s disabled dance artists, building the market to support long-term careers, encouraging greater cultural participation by disabled audiences, and focusing on the development and engagement of both "mainstream" and disabled audiences.

Capacity Building

The project will support independent European disabled artists to develop their own abilities to package, market and present their work and artistic value to a wide range of cultural stakeholders including performing arts programmers, commissioners and arts managers. It will support the development of a sustainable peer network.

The project will undertake a major programme of building the knowledge of mainstream cultural managers and programmers – building knowledge of the quality of work by a unique generation of artists, but also sharing the expertise and experience of the project partners in supporting artists and building audiences for their work.

Public Performances and Commissions

Europe Beyond Access represents an unprecedented trans-national investment in presenting, supporting, and commissioning the work of world-class disabled performing artists, aiming to celebrate their high-quality and innovative work, raise standards and expectations for disabled artists, and establish a network of organizations committed to collaborative support at the highest level, with initiatives including 10 new project commissions, 21 showcases of disabled artists' work, and four duets spanning four countries available for touring.

Project Partners

Europe Beyond Access is created with support from the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union. An enlarged consortium will continue to support disabled and Deaf performing artists across Europe. British Council (UK), who initiated and led the first Europe Beyond Access programme from 2018-2023, is now an associated partner.

The second generation of the project is ran by 10 high-profile European cultural organisation: Skånes Dansteater (Sweden), Holland Dance Festival (Netherlands), Onassis Stegi (Grece), Oriente Occidente (Italy), Kampnagel – Internationales Zentrum für schönere Künste (Germany), CODA Oslo International Dance Festival (Norway), Centrum Kultury ZAMEK w Poznaniu (Poland), Project Arts Centre (Ireland), Mercat de les Flors (Spain), Culturgest – Fundação CGD (Portugal).