Body Shift

Art Spark Dance provides people with an outlet for creative expression through movement and dance. Difference is exciting and ignites creativity.

The dance world can be extremely unfriendly to anyone who does not conform to the image of the young, tall, thin, and able-bodied dancer. This not only excludes anyone with a disability, but also leaves out older adults, people with larger bodies and even experienced dancers who have grown older or whose bodies have changed. Mixed-ability dance offers an alternative way of approaching dance. It ac

knowledges, through the term mixed-ability, that all of us move in unique and different ways. This uniqueness becomes an asset, not a problem or something that must be hidden or ignored, in a mixed-ability setting. Mixed-ability dance provides a richer and more diverse setting from which anyone can explore movement and the body.

04/03/2026

A free workshop for dance educators with Krissie Marty, Master Trainer for the Wolf Trap Institute.

Come gather practical tools, reflect on teaching practice, and bring your own lesson plan ideas to workshop in community.

Together, we’ll experience and unpack a movement exercise while practicing reflection as an essential teaching tool.

With support from Art Spark Texas, we’ll also explore meaningful inclusion of students with disabilities.

📅 April 18, 2026
📍 Creative Action, Austin

Register here: tinyurl.com/reimagineyourteaching 🔗

02/26/2026

⏰ Last reminder! ⏰ Join us this Saturday, February 28, 4–6 PM at Rosedale School for a Professional Learning Opportunity: Inclusive Dance Teaching with DanceAbility 💫

Organized by Art Spark Texas’ Dance program, this session will explore the DanceAbility method through discussion and practice. You’ll learn inclusive, adaptable movement tools you can bring into your classroom, community, or creative practice.

✅ Practical exercises
✅ Inclusive facilitation tools
✅ Open to dance educators, teaching artists, teachers, therapists, and movement facilitators
📍 Rosedale School (Austin, TX)
🕓 4:00–6:00 PM

🔗 Register here: https://forms.gle/oB9q7eG6g446B8gh7

Special thanks to Rosedale Foundation for making this professional learning opportunity possible. 💛

AustinArts DisabilityInclusion

02/20/2026

We’re excited to share that Rhythms of Resilience has been officially published by Tractus Art. This book was created to reflect real experiences, real bodies, and real possibilities - centering access from the very start.

We hope this story reaches children and families who don’t often see themselves reflected in books, and that it opens space for more stories to come.

You can read more about the project here.
Links to purchase the book:

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/rhythm-of-resilience-tractus-art/1149014120

https://www.amazon.com/Rhythm-Resilience-Story-Dance-Determination/dp/1968296026/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3JQLO46JSNEY6&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.mW3_-poGXTTZsX6RnxFATNzx-_7f_B8PE3

www.tractusart.com 🔗

12/18/2025

No Elements Dance Class this Saturday ❌
We’ll be back in 2026 🎊

Wishing you a restful holiday season, can’t wait to move together again in the new year! 🎉

11/12/2025

✨ ELEMENTS with MICHELE OWENS ✨

Join us November 15, 2–4pm at Rosedale School for a powerful, playful, inclusive dance session led by Austin educator Michele Owens.

For 25+ years, Michele has created welcoming dance spaces with teens with learning disabilities, older adults, kids, and women in correctional facilities. Her classes center improvisation, dignity, and the truth that movement belongs to everyone.

Come as you are. No dance experience needed. All bodies, ages 16 and up, all access needs welcome. 💛

📅 Sat, Nov 15
🕑 2:00–4:00 pm
📍 Rosedale School, 7505 Silvercrest Dr, Austin
💸 Sliding scale $5–$20

10/23/2025

We have an amazing guest teacher for elements this Saturday.

Maka is a curator and cultural manager based in Tbilisi, Georgia. With a background in theatre and social psychology, she combines these two disciplines into a deep commitment to use the performing arts as a tool for fostering connections between marginalized and underrepresented social groups. In 2022, Maka founded InForm – Platform for Inclusive Minds, a non-profit organization dedicated to bringing disability narratives into the performing arts scene in Georgia. Under her leadership, InForm has established an inclusive contemporary dance theatre group that includes dancers and actors of mixed abilities. The troupe produces original and collaborative performances both locally and internationally, and conducts educational programs to nurture an inclusive arts community.

Maka is a CEC ArtsLink Fellow and is spending the whole month of October with us here at Art Spark Texas. Her fellowship is supported by CEC ArtsLink. CEC ArtsLink supports transnational cultural mobility and collaboration, empowering artists and arts leaders to engage communities in dialogue and creative projects for a more equitable, compassionate and sustainable world.

Elements at Rosedale School from 2-4pm, Saturday the 25th.

10/16/2025

🌀 Join us for this month’s Elements class!
📅 October 25th | 2–4 PM
📍 Rosedale School ()

This inclusive and accessible dance workshop is free and open to all adults (18+), with a sliding scale of $5–$15 - and no one will be turned away due to lack of funds. No dance experience necessary!

We’re thrilled to welcome special guest teacher Mariam (Maka) Chkhaidze, a curator and cultural manager from Tbilisi, Georgia 🇬🇪. With a background in theatre and social psychology, Maka uses the performing arts to foster connection and understanding among marginalized and underrepresented communities.✨ Come connect, move, and explore the elements together.

09/16/2025

This Saturday, September 20th from 2-4pm, ELEMENTS is back! Veronica DeWitt will lead this inclusive dance class and Juan Muñoz will be in the room moving and grooving with you. Open to everyone - disabled and non-disabled dancers welcome and no formal experience is required.

🗓 Sat, Sept 20 • 2–4 PM
📍 Rosedale School (7505 Silvercrest Dr, Austin)
💵 Sliding scale $5–$20; no one turned away. No registration—just show up.
To find out more about the class, check our website.

Questions: [email protected]

05/17/2025

Elements class today at Rosedale School, 7505 Silvercrest Dr, Austin, TX 78757 from 2-4pm with Andrea Ariel Dance Theatre.

Andrea will be teaching Soundpainting!

Andrea Ariel is a Certified Multi-disciplinary Soundpainter & Educator and is well respected for her innovations with the form. She has worked with the creator of Soundpainting, Walter Thompson, since 1998 and was an instrumental part of the early development years at Think Tanks in Woodstock, NY from 1999-2005. AADT hosted two collaborations with Thompson with her company, Andrea Ariel Dance Theatre, in Austin in 1999 and 2001. Since that time Andrea has continued her work with the form in Austin and with Strike Anywhere Performance Ensemble in New York City. She has participated in four International Think Tanks held in Italy and Spain. She represented the City of Austin in Spain as a Creative Ambassador in Dance in both 2014 and 2019. With Thompson’s move to Europe in 2005, Soundpainting is now practiced widely across Europe in both professional and educational circles. AADT is the only company practicing and promoting Soundpainting in the Mid-America region. She recently brought this form to the San Francisco Bay Area in California working with both professionals and with students at California State University at East Bay. The company is focused on furthering Austin as the Soundpainting center of the Southwest U.S. and to bringing Soundpainting to communities nationally and internationally.

05/15/2025

The last Elements class before Summer break is this Saturday the 17th from 2-4pm at Rosedale School ✨

This months class will be taught by Andrea Ariel Dance Theatre .ariel.dance and we will explore Soundpainting: A method for engaging students of all ages, ability levels, and art forms in the creative process.

Unlike learning to create within a single style, Soundpainting develops the creative voices of students through an array of structural parameters allowing individual choice and stylistic parameters.

Using the composer, or “Soundpainter,” as teacher, the innate creativity of students is drawn out and developed constructively by way of the gestural choices of the. Soundpainter, enabling each individual, each group, to express their own character in an experiential learning format.

Soundpainting opens doors to creative expression as well as ensemble and community building inviting valuable dialogues and exchanges in diverse settings. Specific themes and subjects, or composed music, movement or text can also be explored using Soundpainting.

Class is sliding scale from $5-20 and no need to register! No one is turned away due to a lack of funds ⭐️

05/14/2025

Elements class Saturday 17th from 2+4pm at Rosedale School.

Soundpainting with Andrea Ariel Dance Theatre

In this class: You will learn a one-of-a-kind, innovative approach to improvisation and live composition using dance, movement, voice, and music. Soundpainting is a unique sign language used to shape improvisations and sculpt group compositions and in real time. The signs given by the Soundpainter (Andrea Ariel) will expand one’s creative capacity and improvisational possibilities while creating a collective experience of composition in the moment.

05/13/2025

🌟 Don’t miss your last chance before summer break to move with us at Elements Dance Class this Saturday! 📅 Happening May 17th from 2–4PM 📍

This all-abilities class features Soundpainting — an improvisational sign language that blends dance, music, voice, and movement in real time. 🎶✨

Led by the incredible Soundpainter Andrea Ariel (.ariel.dance), you’ll explore creative expression like never before.

This event is open to all, and the class fee is sliding scale with a recommended $5-$20 per person, but no one is turned away due to lack of funds. No registration is needed - just show up and dance! ⭐️ See you there!

Address

Austin, TX

Website

http://www.artsparkdance.org/

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