I have been working specifically with dance in museums and heritage sites for nearly two years now, and one thing I can certainly say about working in this environment is that there is always more to discover: museums are such a rich source for creative dance activity. However, what I have learnt during those two years, and throughout my work as a professional dance artist and choreographer more generally, is that dance has the capacity, if introduced in an appropriate way, to engage all individuals, regardless of ability or previous experience.

I have learnt some fantastic introductory/ice-breaker ideas for working with museum objects from the British Museum staff that I will be able to feed into my delivery of dance work in museums in the future, and this just goes to show how much can be gained from artists working collaboratively with museum experts, and engaging young people in that exchange of skills and ideas.

The following ideas are based primarily on the ‘Exploring Objects and Sharing Cultures project’ that I delivered with the British Museum in response to the Roman galleries (particularly Room 70) and particular artefacts associated with Cleopatra, Julius Caesar and Mark Anthony, but there are of course many more possibilities.

Work with handling collections: there was an excellent handling collection at the British Museum, and at most of the other museums with which I have worked to date (which include replicas and real items). These can sometimes be taken away from museums in Loan Boxes, often for a relatively small hire charge, so they can be used as inspiration for dance workshops in schools where those schools are not able to work on-site at their local museum for whatever reason.

Photographer Jo Forrest very kindly came along to take some shots during our rehearsals for our last Dancing in Museums performances of the summer at Creswell Crags. Some of these images captured the peculiar antics of characters Mildred, Henry and Harriet (Jessamin Landamore Coyne, Robert Guy and Lucy Starkey) as they moved around the beautiful site at Creswell Crags.