For as long as people have been people (and even before they were ‘people’ in the modern sense), they have danced. Dance as an expression of human feeling transcends age, sex, gender identity, race, culture, language, creed and even occasion. We dance to mourn and to rejoice, at weddings, funerals and festivals religious or profane. We dance in public and in private, for fun and for profit, at work and at leisure, together and alone. Dance is fundamental to the way our bodies learn to move; babies too young to toddle will already respond to music with rhythmical movement. Dance may be formal or improvised; coolly emblematic or blatantly sensual; through dance the dancer may communicate personal feelings or the accumulated weight of tradition. Dance, in short, is a universal human experience, which also displays the human body at its most versatile. No surprise, then, that artists have been attracted to the challenge of recording the many different ways and occasions where dancing happens - an attraction which the RWA explores in Dance Out, a stunning new exhibition of paintings, drawings, film and more based in dance culture. 

Among the diverse events related to the exhibition, Justine Hopkins will lead three evening sessions looking at how artists across the ages have been inspired by the significance, symbolism and above all the spectacle of dance.

Each evening begins with a half hour tour of the Dance Out exhibition, led by Justine and focusing on specific artworks which broadly complement the themes of the evening’s lecture. The three sessions are linked, but each is also complete in itself and can be enjoyed separately.