“Unabashedly emotional” Sanjoy Roy, The Guardian
Ella Mesma Company is an Afro-Latin and Hip Hop dance theatre company that undoes limiting beliefs by exploring and celebrating cultural and social identity and diversity. With a mixed of dance forms and theatre, we create bold, political, personal work that anyone can watch.
Ella Mesma Company seeks to champion a dance technique which is instinctive and meditative, empowering and inspiring both audiences and artists alike. The company have a unique movement language: Yoga, along with a diverse range of techniques including contemporary dance, contact work from partner dances, breaking, afro-latin and folkloric dances, capoeira and aerial dance informs the company in their teaching in professional and community settings, and choreographic practice.
Ella Mesma Company believes in:
- Investing in our team
- Collaborating and empowering through the arts
- Paying respects to our ancestral dance forms and creating an innovative mix of these styles
- Celebrating diversity and promoting equality
- Using theatre as a tool to create ethical political, personal work and conversation
- Ensuring that anyone can watch and enjoy theatre
Mesma likes to engage with a real audience: those with and without a background in dance and for her work to speak to the heart , which is why she also uses theatre in her work. The company also like to connect to their audience through discussions and often include events in the foyer to create interest and understanding around the context of the work. The company also love to tour their workshops and outreach work, including professional class, community class, and a new sex education project for schools which tours alongside ‘Ladylike‘.
Ladylike premiered at Sadler’s Wells on June 8th 2017 and is currently on tour. Mesma is currently developing solo ‘Papillon‘, and a new group work for 2019. Read more about the different productions here, and upcoming production dates here. You can also train with the company in Latin, breaking and Yoga here. If you would like to discuss booking a show please contact us here
