Australian Dance Week, 2026. Ausdance ACT

Perusing the Canberra program for Australian Dance Week I was instantly surprised by news of the opening celebration, which will take place on International Dance Day, 29 April. Ausdance ACT has programmed this event to occur on top of Mount Ainslie, a beautiful spot whose current vista would thrill the designers of Canberra, Walter Burley Griffin and his partner, Marion Mahony Griffin.

But delving further into the choice of an outdoor venue, Cathy Adamek, Executive Director of Ausdance ACT, explained a little about why Mount Ainslie was chosen. There are a few reasons but importantly, according to Ngunnawal Elder Aunty Serena, Mount Ainslie figures significantly in the cultural background of the Indigenous people who inhabited the area long before it became Canberra. Aunty Serena will deliver the Welcome to Country at the opening. You may hear more from her about Mount Ainslie’s significance.

Here is what the program tells us of the event:

Join us on top of Mount Ainslie for International Dance Day as we celebrate 2026 Australian Dance Week. Hosted by Ausdance ACT Executive Director Dr Cathy Adamek featuring a special appearance by the Diamonds of Dance Week! Dress in your sparkly best and join us for a celebratory picnic. Traditional welcome and smoking ceremony by Ngunnawal Elder Aunty Serena from Yukkumbruk Dreaming. To be officially opened by Minister for the Arts Michael Pettersson MLA.

LIz Lea, study for *Diamond*. Photo: © O & J Wikner Photography

But to the dance component for the week. There is, as is the usual practice, many Canberra dance schools offering free classes over the week for prospective students to try out various approaches to dance education. There is also a variety of workshops for beginners to professionals in dance-related activities and projects. What stands out from an overall look at the program is the diversity of dance that characterises the Canberra dance scene. Dance Week in Canberra includes items focusing on ballet and contemporary dance as well as folk dance, hip hop activities, street performances, dance as a meditative activity, and so much more.

Classes with ZEST. Dance for Well Being will be part of the 2026 program. Photo: © Art Atelier

Also featured in the 2026 program is the work of Floeur Alder and her colleagues. Alder does not live or work on a regular basis in the ACT but she has a long-standing connection with the city. She is the daughter of Lucette Aldous and Alan Alder, both of whom, after exceptional careers as performers across the world, were responsible for helping develop the tertiary dance component of the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA). Alan Alder was born in Canberra, took his early dance training there and went to Canberra High School. There are still various relatives of the Alder family living in Canberra so it is a pleasure to have his daughter as part of the 2026 ACT Dance Week program.

The film POINTE. Dancing on a Knife’s Edge, which focuses on Alder’s recovery from a brutal knife attack that left her badly injured, will be shown as part of the week’s activities. Adamek was especially touched by the way dance was part of Alder’s recovery process and tells me the film ‘shows how dance can be a personal story’ and that ‘it indicates that dance can be used as a form of therapy’. In addition, Alder will give a solo performance of Djilba a work created by Alder and artist Virginia Ward that combines dance, poetry and imagery.

Floeur Alder in a moment from *Djilba*. Photo: © Michael Juliff

See more about Djilba, including a trailer and a demonstration by Alder of a particular section of her choreography, at this link. Alder will also give a special class that features Boris Kniaseff’s floor barre technique, a technique admired and taught earlier by her mother Lucette Aldous.

The 2026 ACT Dance Week is brimming with surprising activities. Don’t miss them. See the full program at this link.

And below is the view from Mount Ainslie where the opening event will be held. Follow Anzac Parade from the War Memorial in the foreground, over Lake Burley Griffin to Old Parliament House then on to New Parliament House. Other significant Canberra buildings (including the High Court and the National Library) are in the image and forming the background is the beautiful Brindabella mountain range.

Michelle Potter, 7 April 2026

Youth Dance Festival turns 40

Canberra’s Youth Dance Festival has been a significant part of the city’s dance scene for an impressive four decades. It will shortly celebrate its 40th birthday with a program featuring a total of 45 short works danced over three nights by an incredible 800 students from 28 Canberra and district schools. Put together by Cathy Adamek, current director of Ausdance ACT, the 2024 program is called ‘What do you dream?’ and focuses on personal choices as life slowly returns to a stage where COVID no longer rules our lifestyle. As Adamek tells me, ‘This is the first time that the current generation can think about their future in terms of stability, in a way that is not inhibited.’

The 2024 theme follows on from those of 2021–2023 with the 2021 Festival, the first directed by Adamek, needing to be created as a digital production as a result of the COVID pandemic. The Festivals of 2022 and 2023 were live events but, nevertheless, their themes reflected the difficulties that had arisen as a result of the pandemic.

Dancers from Gungahlin College in their work from the 2021 Festival. Photo: © Andrew Sikorski, Art Atelier Photography

The process of getting the works onstage is a complex one, identified by Adamek as a matter of ‘co-creativity’. She suggests that it is this structured process that has made the project a durable one over the years. The choreography is largely student-led but the Festival has a group of mentors who visit schools to assist and advise, and who provide support and guidance to the students as they prepare their works for the performance. In addition, and as the result of a specific donation, the Festival will have (for the first time since 2021) a special opening work choreographed jointly by KG from Passion & Purpose Academy, Caroline Wall from Fresh Funk and Francis Owusu from Kulture Break.

I am fascinated too by the importance during the development process of a graphic item, in 2024 designed by Japanese-Australian artist Natsuko Yonezawa. ‘The graphic is part of the creative impetus,’ Adamek says. ‘I always suggest that creators use it if they want an inspiration for things like colours, tones, costumes. It’s part of giving the participants an awareness that creating a piece of dance theatre is not just about choreography.’

The graphic designed by Natsuko Yonezawa for the 2024 Youth Dance Festival

Canberra’s Youth Dance Festival began back in 1984 as the High Schools Dance Competition, an initiative of Melba High School teacher Marie de Blasio. It was supported by Audsance (then known as the Australian Association for Dance Education) and by the city’s two dance companies, Canberra Dance Theatre and Human Veins Dance Theatre. What followed in 1985 was a slightly changed format. As a result of an Ausdance survey of Australian dance, and spurred on by having seen a youth dance festival in Perth, run by the West Australian Department of Education for regional schools, Julie Dyson and Hilary Trotter worked with the then president of Ausdance, Annette Douglas (also a dance teacher at Dickson College), to set up a non-competitive, student-led event that would focus on dance but embrace other art forms such as poetry, music and design. Teachers were offered mentoring and the event would be held in a professional venue with professional lighting and an experienced producer. Further changes were made in 1987 when a time limit was set for each work.

(left) Finale from Youth Dance Festival, 1986. Theme: Peace in what was the International Year of Peace; (right) Dancers from Canberra High School, Youth Dance Festival 1987. Theme: Discovery. Photographers not identified.

Since those early years the concept of a non-competitive, student-led arts/dance festival remains. The 2024 Youth Dance Festival takes place over three nights, 6-8 November, with each night having different schools performing. See this link for booking information and for a list of schools performing on specific nights.

To support the Youth Dance Festival so it might continue its work see this link to an Australian Cultural Fund project.

Michelle Potter, 22 October 2024
with thanks to Cathy Adamek, Emma Dykes and Julie Dyson for their input into this post.

Featured image: Scene from Debora di Centa’s opening work at the Youth Dance Festival 2021. Theme: Digital Dystopia Utopia. Photo: © Andrew Sikorski, Art Atelier Photography

Ausdance ACT’s new director. Dr Cathy Adamek

Dr Cathy Adamek thinks it is time for regional re-engagement in dance. Adamek, who has had an extraordinarily diverse career across art forms to date, has just been appointed Director, Ausdance ACT. Her long-term vision is for making connections, including eventually establishing touring initiatives, initially between independent artists working in South Australia and the ACT. This aspect of a much wider vision seems very much like a ‘seize the moment’ one. On the one hand there are Adamek’s strong connections with Adelaide and, on the other, in the current COVID 19 situation the Adelaide-Canberra ‘bubble’ already exists even as borders with some other states and territories remain closed. It is also just the kind of initiative Canberra artists need.

Adamek began her dance life learning ballet in Adelaide with Joanna Priest and Sheila Laing. She was accepted into WAAPA to continue dance studies at tertiary level but an injury forced her to move to acting. Adamek eventually continued her training at NIDA and the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art in London and, with the addition of a strong musical background since childhood, she has pursued a career across dance, physical theatre, choreography, film, and electronic music, and has acted as a voice-over in various situations. She completed her PhD in 2017 at the University of South Australia. Her thesis, entitled Adelaide Dance Music Culture: Late 1980s–Early 1990s, reflected her interest in connecting with new music as well as her experiences on the dance floor in ‘the second summer of love’. A recent residency at Dance Hub SA saw her working on a piece called Open Bliss, a development from her PhD research and one of several of her personal choreographies. She has tutored at various institutions and most recently has been President of Ausdance SA. With her diverse background she describes herself as a ‘creative producer’.

Portrait of Cathy Adamek. Photo: © Meaghan Coles

Along with her interest in establishing regional re-engagement, Adamek says that her aim in her new position in Canberra is basically to serve the needs of Ausdance. ‘I have had 25 years of working in the arts,’ she says ‘now I want to work to help others in the dance community. I also have a particular interest in turning dance works into film and to extending that interest out to schools where there is a need for different perspectives and training.’ She also has a particular passion for ensuring that dance is developed from a dramaturgical point of view. This interest, she says, grew from her background at NIDA in the 1990s. ‘It was a hybrid era,’ she says, ‘when art forms were brought together. I want to present dance in a theatrical way. It has to be a journey in movement and with logic and theatricality.’

Why Canberra I wonder? I suggest to her that it doesn’t always have a strong profile to many outside the city. ‘It’s a lot like “secret Adelaide”, she counters. ‘Besides, I love travelling, I love going to new places. Canberra sits between those beautiful mountains. It has the Gallery and other collecting institutions. I had no hesitation.’

Like many arts organisations, Ausdance ACT has struggled a little in recent times. Cathy Adamek could well be the one to deliver its rejuvenation.

Michelle Potter, 14 October 2020