The body—both in its individual dimension and in the experience of community—is our first and most discerning instrument of relationship with the world. Through an aesthetic process understood in its broadest sense, the body gathers knowledge, understanding, and the capacity to communicate and narrate the self. Dance is the practice through which the body can translate this awareness into its highest form: narrating, sublimating and celebrating life in all its facets and in its most human and profound meaning.

This connection is particularly evident in the many forms of folk dance: celebrations of the passing of time and the seasons; expressions of our relationship with nature and with one another; dances of labour, work, struggle and pain; of festivity, serenity and carefree joy; magical and ritual dances, or expressive and identity-forming ones.

The project Danzando Memorie sul Mare (Dancing Memories by the Sea) develops from the inspirations and memories held within the rich vocabulary of the Marche region’s musical collections—true libraries bearing witness to traditions, uses and customs. Through practices and public events developed in dialogue with local communities, these materials become an opportunity to reformulate and reinterpret tradition for the future. Revisiting these forms today offers an opportunity to reconnect with the deep-rooted knowledge from which we all come, and to re-inform bodies about their own history and the identity of the present, reconnecting past and present without interruption.

The entire project follows a path of research and practice, connected to the experience of movement as a means of knowledge around belonging and memory, and as a bridge between generations.

In this context of dialogue among territories and traditions, movement practice—as a tool of inquiry and a space for relationship and personal expression—becomes a vehicle for a culture of proximity: an investment in people’s quality of life, in supporting and valuing cultures and singularities, while fostering awareness of individual, civic and social identities.

The emotional and physical body reveals itself as a living archive of experience. Through movement practice, the relationship between bodies and across differences—encouraging self-listening and connection with the other—can generate new narratives with which communities may identify, activating inclusive and heterophilous processes of collaboration.