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ºÚÁÏÕýÄÜÁ¿ to lead international research exploring creativity, movement and environmental change

Thursday, 1 October, 2026

ºÚÁÏÕýÄÜÁ¿ has secured a £520,356.82 funding award from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) for a new three-year international research project exploring how dance and creative movement can transform people's relationships with the places and environments in which they live.

Led by Professor Victoria Hunter, Dance Landings: Dancing Deep Ecologies of Place will begin in October 2026 and bring together researchers and movement practitioners from the UK, France, Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand.

The 36-month project brings together Professor Victoria Hunter and Michelle Elliott from BSU; Julie Perrin and Laurent Pichaud from Paris 8 University; Melanie Kloetzel from the University of Calgary; and Karen Barbour from the University of Waikato.

Speaking with Professor Victoria Hunter about the research, she commented:

"I’m thrilled that Dance Landings has received AHRC funding. This project responds to pressing issues of climate change and human-place connection exploring how embodied knowledge central to movement practices can contribute insights into these themes. I am looking forward to working with our fantastic colleagues at the Universities of Calgary, Waikato and Paris 8, and with partners including the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Canada, the Schumacher Foundation UK, and the Al Sarab Dance School in Lebanon.

“Through dance and movement, we’ll explore our connections to place, foster intercultural exchange, and bring together perspectives from across disciplines and communities. By working across various disciplines, we hope to generate new ways of understanding and responding to the climate crisis, while demonstrating the transformative potential of dance to connect people, places and ideas.”

Professor John Strachan, Pro Vice-Chancellor Research and Enterprise at ºÚÁÏÕýÄÜÁ¿, said:

"This award reflects ºÚÁÏÕýÄÜÁ¿'s commitment to research that combines creativity, collaboration and real-world impact. By bringing together international expertise across disciplines, Professor Hunter's project demonstrates how the arts can contribute meaningfully to some of the most pressing challenges facing society today."

Exploring relationships between movement, place and ecology

At the heart of Dance Landings is a central question: can dance help us rethink our relationship with the Earth?

The research will investigate how land-based dance and creative movement practices can generate new forms of knowledge about relationships between people, places and the wider living environment. It will consider a range of practices, including site-specific and place-based dance, folk and ceremonial practices, and ecosomatic approaches.

Rather than treating land simply as a backdrop or resource, the project will explore the idea of land as an active ecological partner in human life. It will bring dance research into dialogue with disciplines including ecology, human geography, agriculture and soil science to examine how embodied experiences of place might contribute to more reciprocal and sustainable relationships with the environment.

The research will pay particular attention to practices that encourage care, mutuality and reciprocity, exploring how recognising humans as part of ecological systems might influence the ways people understand and respond to environmental challenges.

From embodied experience to environmental engagement

Through workshops, creative experimentation, movement practices, international exchanges, talks and public engagement activities, the project will investigate how dance and the creative arts can reveal and deepen relationships with land.

It will also explore how different cultural traditions understand and express relationships between people, place and environment, while developing a new approach described as ‘dance landings’. This approach brings together dance, environmental humanities and ecological thinking to investigate how embodied and creative practices can contribute to environmental education, public engagement and wider ecological initiatives.

The project will work with researchers, artists, Indigenous artists, environmental practitioners, educators, community groups, stakeholders and members of the public. Activities will include opportunities to experience and interpret landscapes through movement, drawing, walking, mapping and other creative practices.

An international and interdisciplinary collaboration

Dance Landings builds on established research and creative collaborations across its four participating countries. International exchange will allow the project to explore both differences and connections between cultural approaches to land, movement and ecological knowledge.

An important aspect of the research will be creating opportunities for dialogue between different ways of knowing while recognising the cultural specificity of land-based practices. The project will also engage with questions surrounding land ownership, access, cultivation and belonging.

In its second year, the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in Canada will support a cross-cultural residency for dance artists working with land-based practices. The residency will provide an opportunity for artists to share knowledge, skills and insights across cultural and geographical contexts.

Responding to environmental challenges through creative practice

The research responds to the climate and biodiversity emergencies by examining alternative ways of understanding ecological relationships. It starts from the premise that environmental challenges are not solely scientific or technological issues but also involve questions about how people understand their place within the wider living world.

By bringing embodied knowledge and creative practice into dialogue with environmental humanities, ecology, geography, education, agriculture and related disciplines, Dance Landings will investigate whether moving differently with places can contribute to thinking differently about them.

Over the next three years, the project will bring together artists, researchers, environmental practitioners and communities to explore how movement can deepen connections with place, inspire new forms of ecological understanding, and contribute to public conversations about environmental change. The research will position BSU at the forefront of an emerging international field connecting creativity, ecology and environmental action.