Gwdihŵ

This practice research output was made with participants in Cyrff Ystwyth and this year was led by Andrew Evans, a company member with learning disabilities. The output examines his particular response to his chosen theme of 'owl' and presents an example of how feeling and thinking are intertwined. Challenging notions of intellectual disability that dispute a person's capacity for independent thought or question the validity of such thought, this piece of work considers every movement brought by Evans, as choreographic material that evidences this participant's particular thinking. The nature of this thinking is embodied and shared between the performers and the audience. The output challenges perceptions of people with learning disabilities but also presents new aesthetic possibilities that extend beyond the range of normative performance lexicons. It offers an example of current theories in dance dramaturgy; (see Hanson 2015). Theatrical techniques and the appearance of the individuals in public through these techniques formed the methodological ground.