Partnering Workshop: Mobility Aid-Users x Non-Mobility Aid-Users

In this workshop, we’ll learn about the protocols and pathways involved in partnering successfully with mobility aid-using performers in professional and indie rooms. Over 4 hours we will cover anti-ableism, cultural safety and consent in relation to working collaboratively with disabled performers, and explore both open and set partnering exercises to leave you with nuanced physical skills to take into other rooms. Participants will leave with a greater range of knowledge around how to create safer and more equitable working spaces for mobility aid-users in dance and physical theatre industries, and how to move with mobility aid-users using rich dynamic qualities, spaciousness, and fluidity. This workshop is for non-mobility aid-users of any career stage working in dance and physical theatre, and all material and exercises will be designed around the interests and capacities of participants.

I'll be presenting this twice in November, with the same plan on both days. Please aim to register by 9:30am the Saturday before so I can plan the workshop content around your areas of interest (but signing up closer to the day is welcome too).

🫱🏽‍🫲🏻 Is this workshop for me?If you are: a dancer, physical theatre performer, choreographer or director who wants to use your privileges to improve how our industry treats and works with disabled performers and makers interested in learning from disabled perspectives, and comfortable with your own perspective being gently challenged and exposed to new ideas in a supported but honest learning environment based in professional or independent sectors that don't have a specific focus on working with disabled communities either not a mobility aid-user, or you're planing to participate in this workshop without a mobility aid you use part-time Then this workshop is intended for you. If you are: a teacher of any type of body-based performance who wants to develop safer learning spaces for disabled performers a studio or venue manager, arts worker or board member interested in improving disabled cultural safety at your studio, venue, company or organisation interested in applying what you learn here for working in the disability arts sector, as a disability support worker, or in any settings with a specific focus on disabled participants a mobility aid-user who wants to learn more about mobility aid-using dance technique Then this workshop is not intended for you. But if you're interested in these topics and want to collaborate on your professional development, please feel free to reach out and we can discuss if my other training for dance and drama teachers, my work specifically for organisations or companies, or my classes for mobility aid-users is a better fit for you. You're welcome to reach me anytime through the "Contact host" link at the top or bottom of this page.

📋 Workshop Plan1pm - 1:20pm Grounding, Acknowledgement of Country, Introductions: talking 1:20pm - 2pm Cultural awareness, self-awareness and consensual collaboration: talking with visual diagrams 2pm - 2:10pm Break 2:10pm - 2:30pm Warm-up: self-guided & guided movement 2:30pm - 3:15pm Physical foundations & Improvising: guided movement & group open improvisation 3:15pm - 3:55pm Set partnering phrase: gestural dance theatre* & talking 3:55pm - 4pm Break 4pm - 4:40pm Set partnering phrase: contemporary ballet* & talking 4:40pm - 5pm Reflections & Check-out: talking

*Set choreography we'll learn will be created in response to the preferences and interests participants share when signing up - these examples are just starting points. For set partnering phrases, participants will learn the phrase with me one at a time in front of the room, and the space will be facilitated to create a collaborative and curious environment where being observed is a low-stakes experience. Phrases will be adjusted to each participant's own body and style. To offer a holistic and responsive learning environment, this workshop is capped at 8 participants.

👨🏻‍🏫 About the facilitatorPatrick Gunasekera (he/him) is a contemporary ballet and theatre artist, cultural safety trainer, and teaching artist based on Whadjuk Noongar Boodjar. He has taught dance and experimental performance classes independently since 2024, mainly exploring ergonomic dynamic movement, responsive and democratic class structures, and teaching techniques developed through his own highly interdisciplinary and body integrity-focused performance practices. Since 2023 he has facilitated disabled-only spaces for artists to develop creative processes that draw from and centre their own voices and knowledge. He has worked as an access and inclusion advisor with numerous artist-run, small-to-medium, major and national organisations for several years, and since 2025 has run pay-what-you-can anti-ableism workshops for independent artists. Since 2019 he has extended mobility aid-using dance technique with lived experiences as a cane-, walker-, and later manual wheelchair-user, with a particular focus on complex holistic movement and professional practice, which he recently begun formalising as Gunasekera technique.