rooted in where we're from
growing together
Mandate
Branch Collective is a nonprofit group focused on the development and sustainability of the dance community in Northern Ontario, based in Sudbury. Programming centres around the cultivation of dance and performance as art, as a practice and as a way to bring movers of all abilities and levels of training together. Branch Collective produces programming that both meets the needs of the dance community and provides new and challenging experiences. All programming is designed and intended for adults.
Mission
Branch Collective presents programming that is designed to elevate dance as a form, creating a more regular presence in the community and becoming a part of the conversation of how we see art, ourselves and our world. Programming invests in the growth and development of dance educators, artists and collectives. We believe in the importance of working together in a spirit of collaboration across geographic location, dance style, artistic form and experience level.
Goals
To cultivate community by encouraging and supporting people who are newly curious or have an established interest in dance, movement and performance to interact with dance on a level that meets their desire, including both participants and audiences of dance.
To provide programming in forms of training, creative process and performance for dancers at all levels.
To create diversity within the programming we produce, actively reaching out to artists and participants who identify as a person of colour, indigenous, LGBTQ2SA+, having a mental or physical disability, and practitioners of a non-western dance form. We reflect regularly on the homogeneous status of (most) western dance communities and produce with that information in mind; abandoning ideas of dance form hierarchy and ideal body type.
To connect dance with other art forms.
To pay all artists contracted in programming.
To provide affordable programming or systems of financial support for participants to programming.
To create a digital lineage and database of dance artists and educators.
Branch
The inspiration for Branch Collective’s name is based on the image of a tree. Much like the roots of a tree, people of Northern Ontario are interconnected with the geography and way of life in the North that contributes to who they are. The dance artists and teachers from Northern Ontario come from a place rife with talent, inspirational teachers and a love for dance. This love is the root of our trunk, our community. Branch Collective aims to be just one branch of the tree of the Northern Ontario dance community. A branch reaches into the sky towards the sun to grow stronger and provide sustenance for the rest of the tree. Branch Collective would like to act as a branch, strongly connected to the community and our roots, while reaching out to continue to grow and learn.