Tag: workshops

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News / Announcements

Vortex Workshop with Christopher “Unpezverde” Núñez – December 6, 2025

image description in caption
Christopher moves his arms, creating curved lines while a dim light bathes his body, creating the effect of being in a cave.

Presented as part of our Fall/Winter 2025 guest artist workshop series:

Vortex Workshop with Christopher “Unpezverde” Núñez

About Christopher “Unpezverde” Núñez:

Christopher “Unpezverde” Núñez is a Costa Rican-American artist who works in choreography, film, installation, sound, and blind art. His work explores the connections between access, trust, mythology, anthropology, and heritage. Núñez contemplates the body, its movement, and how it interacts with energy and force in relation to space/time and from his visual impairment.

About This Workshop:

Vortex explores the anatomical planes (sagittal, transverse, frontal) and the axes of movement (anteroposterior, mediolateral, longitudinal) through the body and  space/time. Vortex is spatial alchemy. Disabled dancers learn to navigate internal and external spaces using our heritage, lineage, memory, proprioception, breathwork and  magical existence.

Workshop Date and Details:

This workshop will be offered virtually on Zoom.

The workshop is two hours long, from 4 PM to 6 PM on  Saturday December 6, 2025

To register for this workshop series, send an email to info@darkroomballet.com with the subject line Vortex Workshop with Christopher “Unpezverde” Núñez

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News / Announcements

Special Movement Workshop with Kayla Hamilton – November 19, 2025

image description in caption
A headshot of Kayla Hamilton, who is a milk chocolate colored Black woman. She is posing in front of a blurred brick wall, wearing a long sleeve black and tan striped shirt. She has light makeup and is smiling. Her black and golden locs are down.

Presented as part of our Fall/Winter 2025 guest artist workshop series:

Special Movement Workshop with Kayla Hamilton

About Kayla Hamilton:

Kayla Hamilton is a Texas-born, Bronx-based dancer, performance maker, educator, consultant and artistic director of Circle O—a cultural organization uplifting Black Disabled and other multiply marginalized creatives.

About This Workshop:

Come exactly as you are—rested or restless, steady or stirred. In this improvisational movement space, there are no set steps and no pressure to perform. We begin with breath, curiosity, and a shared willingness to see what wants to emerge. Movement may arrive small and subtle—or bold and expansive. It might surprise you, delight you, or teach you something  about how your body wants to be known.

Together, we’ll play, experiment, and follow sensation as it leads us into rhythm, stillness, or flow. Each moment becomes an invitation to the next. There are no wrong turns—only new possibilities. 

For anyone who craves freedom in movement, trusts—or wants to trust—their impulses, and is ready to say “yes” , together.

Workshop Date and Details:

This workshop will be offered virtually on Zoom.

The workshop is two hours long, from 4 PM to 6 PM on  Wednesday November 19, 2025

To register for this workshop series, send an email to info@darkroomballet.com with the subject line Movement Workshop with Kayla Hamilton

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News / Announcements

December 2025: Developing Your Voice Intensive with Alex Bulmer

image is described in caption
A white woman in her fifties with short light brown hair stands against a wall. She has black headphones on her head and wears a brown leather jacket with zippers at the wrist. Bright eyed she looks at the camera with her hands raised to the headphones.

Presented as part of our Fall/Winter 2025 guest artist workshop series:

Developing Your Voice — A Vocal Training Intensive Workshop Series with Alex Bulmer

About Alex Bulmer:

Alex Bulmer is an award winning Blind playwright, voice teacher, actor and performance maker with thirty five professional years working across Canada and the UK.

She finds joy and potency through mutual  growth and original expression, is dedicated to inter-dependent practice, and guided by an invitation to follow the grain of her own wood.

Alex is co-creator of multiple Blind-led productions including May I Take Your Arm, Perceptual Archaeology, Gesture and Maddy and The Invisible Band of Groovers.

She is artistic director of Toronto-based Fire and Rescue Arts, which de-centres visuality from imagination to creation.

In 1990, Alex graduated with an Advanced Diploma in Voice Studies from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama.

Since then, she has been supporting Blind and Sighted performers to experience vocal freedom – the deep connection between breath and voice, the energy of resonance and vibration and the dynamic physicality of speech.

About This Intensive Workshop Series:

Developing Your Voice is a special intensive workshop series that addresses the specific vocal skills needed by both audio describers of dance and self-describing dancers.

In Alex’s words: The human voice, your voice, is your primary instrument as a describer. When describing Dance, your voice is called upon to be more flexible and expressive. So let’s learn to play your vocal instrument well!

In these workshops, you will learn how to prepare your voice for description, and gain skills to enable you to express language in the most effective way.

The workshop will cover a brief overview of how the voice works, discuss how you can keep your voice healthy, and offer exercises to nourish and develop your vocality, and better engage with the physicality of language.

You will learn a warm up routine that you can practice to develop and support you to vocally best connect Blind audiences with the art of Dance, whether as an audio describer or dance or a self-describing dancer.

Workshop Dates and Details:

These intensive workshops are designed for the learning needs of different professional groups, but can be approached in a cumulative way, with the second workshop building on the skills developed in the first.

They will be offered virtually on Zoom.

All workshops start at 4 PM (Eastern Time), and include 90 minutes of vocal technique followed by 30 minutes of open question and answer time.

  • Wednesday, December 3, 2025: Developing Your Voice for Describers of Dance
  • Thursday, December 4, 2025: Developing Your Voice for Self-Describing Dancers

If you an an audio describer, for the first workshop, please bring a paragraph of text that you can read and practice during the workshop — a sample of audio description from a recent project is ideal! If you are an audio describer or self-describing dancer, for the second workshop, please memorize one sentence that you can use during the workshop — it can be anything!

To register for this transformative workshop series, send an email to info@darkroomballet.com with the subject line Developing Your Voice

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Krishna's Thoughts

November 2025 — Sensory Beyond Sight: A Choreographic Workshop Series with Davian “DJ” Robinson

image is described in the caption
A headshot photo of Davian "DJ" Robinson. He smiles widely, and is wearing a red sweater.

Presented as part of our Fall/Winter 2025 guest artist workshop series:

Sensory Beyond Sight: A Choreographic Workshop Series with Davian “DJ” Robinson

About Davian “DJ” Robinson:

Davian “DJ” Robinson is a passionate and boundary-breaking visually impaired dancer, choreographer, and performer. Drawing from his lived experience and athletic movement style, he creates choreography that is both physically powerful and emotionally resonant. His work blends dynamic storytelling with raw embodiment, inviting audiences into a world where rhythm, resilience, and adaptability redefine how we move and connect. Through both performance and education, Davian challenges conventions and opens new possibilities for inclusive expression in the arts.

About This Intensive Workshop Series:

Sensory Beyond Sight cultivates movement using breath, touch, spatial hearing, weight, and proprioception rather than sight. Developed by visually‑impaired choreographer DJ Robinson, the practice empowers participants to:

• Discover liberating, imaginative movement without visual imitation.
• Deepen body awareness in time and space.
• Build trusting partnerships that translate verbal cues into motion.

Tactile & Creative Supplies:

DJ often designs choreography using a tactile drafting board/felt board.

Magnetic or Velcro pieces represent dancers and pathways, allowing him to map formations by touch and communicate spatial ideas clearly.

This reminder models how tactile tools can replace sight‑based diagrams.

What follows are shopping links for the different equipment options that you can choose to use during the workshop series and continuing on in your own choreographic practice:

  • Wikki Stix Neon Pak (Amazon link)
    Reusable, bendable wax-coated yarn sticks for creative tactile art and sensory play. Great for children, educational projects, and travel activities.
  • DRAFTSMAN Tactile Drawing Board (APH link)
    A specialized tactile drawing board with stylus and film sheets, allowing blind or visually impaired users to create raised-line graphics. Durable and portable, offered by the American Printing House for the Blind.

Workshop Dates and Details:

This workshop series is cumulative, and each of the four workshops builds on the skills developed the week before.

All workshops start at 4 pm (Eastern Time), and are 90 minutes long.

  • Saturday, November 8, 2025: Breath & Foundational Body Awareness
  • Saturday, November 15, 2025: Deep Tactile Awareness & Directionality
  • Saturday, November 22, 2025: Partner Guiding & Shape the Mode Expansion
  • Saturday, November 29, 2025: Trust Guide Series & Culmination

To register for this transformative workshop series, send an email to info@darkroomballet.com with the subject line Sensory Beyond Sight

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News / Announcements

Musicality Concepts in Ballet — A Pro-Level Intensive Workshop Series with Hannah Werbel

photo is described in the caption
Hannah stands on a large rock in a mountain meadow, surrounded by wildflowers and tall pine trees. She stands with her left leg held straight and supporting her, while her right leg is lifted high to the side, nearly horizontal. Her left arm curves overhead, and her right arm stretches toward her raised foot, creating a diagonal line across her body. She wears leggings, a short-sleeve shirt, trail shoes, and sunglasses, with her hair in two braids. The sky is clear, and snow-capped mountains are visible in the distance.

Presented as part of our Fall/Winter 2025 guest artist workshop series:

Musicality Concepts in Ballet — A Pro-Level Intensive Workshop Series with Hannah Werbel (October/November 2025)

About Hannah Werbel:

Trained in classical ballet, with forays into jazz, contemporary and modern swing dance, Hannah has been dancing and playing with music since before she can remember.

As a student of Dark Room Ballet herself, Hannah is excited to share her love of music and expression with the community. She believes in teaching from a perspective of curiosity and play, and is looking forward to helping students discover a sense of expression within the structure of ballet. 

About This Intensive Workshop Series:

Musicality Concepts in Ballet is a special intensive workshop series that analyzes and reinforces select  musicality concepts in the context of a pro-level ballet technique class. Each week, we will explore two contrasting concepts and experiment with them through different combination-based movement patterns. This workshop is designed for disabled dancers who have been dancing ballet consistently for at least one year and have strong ballet vocabulary recall. (If you’re taking ballet class every week, this series is for you!)

Workshop Dates and Details:


 These intensive workshops can be studied either in a standalone or in a cumulative way.

They will be offered virtually on Zoom.

The format of each workshop is similar to a ballet technique class, but with an open floor for questions after each few combinations.

Each workshop is two hours long:

Wednesday evening classes will run from 8 PM to 10 PM (Eastern Time)

Saturday evening classes will run from 6 PM to 8 PM (Eastern Time)

  • Wednesday, October 22, 2025: Staccato vs. Legato 
  • Saturday, October 25, 2025: Accent In vs. Accent Out
  • Wednesday, October 29, 2025: Using the Floor to Absorb vs. Generate Energy
  • Saturday, November 1, 2025: Proprioception vs. Interoception, Dancing from the Inside Out

    If you are a taped floor dancer, have your floor taped as you would normally for ballet technique class, and be ready to dance ballet in a richer, more expressive way!

To register for this workshop series, send an email to info@darkroomballet.com with the subject line Musicality Concepts in Ballet

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News / Announcements

October 2025 Improvisation Intensive Workshop Series with Shannon Brooks

image is described in caption
Shannon crouches on the floor holding a microphone with neon yellow/green tulle draped across their body and smushing their face. They speak/sing into the microphone with their eyes closed. Photo credit: And Keller

Presented as part of our Fall/Winter 2025 guest artist workshop series:

Improvising with our Ecosystems: a Laboratory and Introduction to Improvising with Movement, Sound, and Self-Audio Description with Shannon Brooks

About Shannon Brooks:


Shannon Brooks is a multi-sensory, multimedia  artist working across movement, sound, sculpture, moving image, installation, and social-based practices.

Shannon’s work combines the heightened ritual of performance with the glorious imperfections of process. Their practice revels in the seams and edges of their work, lingers within transitions, and creates strange worlds. Shannon is a self-identified freak/weirdo and uses play and clowning to embrace the nonsensical. Their practice is iterative and spans time, it shifts form and medium to experiment to follow a thread of research or question, is it archival, it pierces into other dimensions.

As a Disabled and low-vision person, Shannon believes access is for everyone, is always transforming, and is a creative force that transforms time, space, and power structures.

About This Intensive Workshop Series:

Improvising with our Ecosystems is laboratory to experiment with different approaches to improvisation, ground into your body’s impulses, explore imaginative embodiments, and play with self-audio description improv with live music. 

Workshop Dates and Details:

These four workshops are set up to build on one another but can be taken separately. 

They will be offered virtually on Zoom.

Each workshop is two hours long:

Thursday classes will run from 6 PM to 8 PM (Eastern Time) and will introduce new improvisation concepts

Saturday classes will run from 4 PM to 6 PM (Eastern Time) and will provide opportunities to more deeply explore those concepts while listening to live music!

  • Thursday, October 9th: Improvising with our Interior Ecosystems: improvising with our bodies, impulses, memories, and self audio description.
  • Saturday, October 11th: Improvising with our Interior Ecosystems: review + practice laboratory with live music.
  • Thursday, October 16th: Improvising with our Exterior Ecosystems: improvising with our environments, materials, and others.
  • Saturday, October 18th: Improvising with our Exterior Ecosystems: review + practice laboratory with live music.

To register for this workshop series, send an email to info@darkroomballet.com with the subject line Improvising with our Ecosystems

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News / Announcements

Upcoming Workshops, Classes & Events — Fall 2025 and Beyond

There is so much to look forward to in the Dark Room Ballet community in the coming months.

Dark Room Ballet with Krishna Washburn will be hosting several amazing blind and visually impaired teaching artists who are highly experienced and deeply passionate about sharing their artistic knowledge — to be a disabled artist today is to be someone living in truth.

These upcoming workshops are open to all adult students, regardless of experience.

So far, the following virtual workshops are scheduled – all via Zoom (listings are in Eastern Time).

Links are being added with details on each workshop, and more information will follow!

If you are interested in attending any or all of these workshops, please email info@darkroomballet.com to begin the registration process.

Improvisation Intensive Workshop Series with Shannon Brooks

Four Saturdays in October:

  • Thursday, October 9, 2025 from 6 PM to 8 PM
  • Saturday, October 11, 2025 from 4 PM to 6 PM
  • Thursday, October 16, 2025 from 6 PM to 8 PM
  • Saturday, October 18, 2025 from 4 PM to 6 PM

Musicality Concepts in Ballet — A Pro-Level Intensive Workshop Series with Hannah Werbel:

  • Wednesday, October 22, 2025: Staccato vs. Legato 
  • Saturday, October 25, 2025: Accent In vs. Accent Out
  • Wednesday, October 29, 2025: Using the Floor to Absorb vs. Generate Energy
  • Saturday, November 1, 2025: Proprioception vs. Interoception, Dancing from the Inside Out

Sensory Beyond Sight, a Choreographic Workshop Series with Davian “DJ” Robinson

Four Saturdays in November:

This four workshop series discusses finding inspiration, creating physical records of choreography and choreographic staging as a memory and communication device, and is rooted in body and breath awareness.

  • Saturday, November 8, 2025 from 4 PM to 5:30 PM
  • Saturday, November 15, 2025 from 4 PM to 5:30 PM
  • Saturday, November 22, 2025 from 4 PM to 5:30 PM
  • Saturday, November 29, 2025 from 4 PM to 5:30 PM


Also in November:

Special Movement Workshop with Kayla Hamilton

We’ll move together—no set steps, no pressure to perform. Just breath, curiosity, and a willingness to see what unfolds. Movement may be small or bold, quiet or expansive, playful or still. Each moment will invite the next.

For anyone ready to explore movement freely, trust their impulses, and say “yes” together.

  • Wednesday November 19, 2025 from 4 PM to 6 PM

Developing Your Voice Intensive with Alex Bulmer:

In December, this special two-day series explores the physicality and anatomy of the voice and language, with a focus on the vocal skills of audio describers on Wednesday, and expanding on those skills for self-describing dancers on Thursday.

  • For Describers of Dance: Wednesday, December 3, 2025 from 4 PM to 6 PM
  • For Self-Describing Dancers: Thursday, December 4, 2025 from 4 PM to 6 PM

Also in December:

Vortex Workshop with Christopher “Unpezverde” Núñez

Vortex explores the anatomical planes (sagittal, transverse, frontal) and the axes of movement (anteroposterior, mediolateral, longitudinal) through the body and space/time. Vortex is spatial alchemy. Disabled dancers learn to navigate internal and external spaces using our heritage, lineage, memory, proprioception, breathwork and magical existence.

  • Saturday December 6, 2025 from 4 PM to 6 PM

Also in October:

On October 15th , the Telephone Film will screen across the country in celebration of White Cane Awareness Day.

After the screening, there will be a pre-recorded conversation with the filmmakers that will be streamed to all organizations involved in the celebration. Visit the link on the Telephone Film website for more info!

And returning in February 2026 for eight consecutive Saturdays from 4 PM to 6 PM:

Dark Room Ballet Introductory Ballet Class

This series prioritizes blind and low-vision adult students.

This repeating series of eight classes introduces students to necessary anatomical concepts like turnout, torso stability, foot sensitivity and mobility, sightless balancing, and the use of a taped floor for orientation.

  • Saturday, February 21, 2026
  • Saturday, February 28, 2026
  • Saturday, March 7, 2026
  • Saturday, March 14, 2026
  • Saturday, March 21, 2026
  • Saturday, March 28, 2026
  • Saturday, April 4, 2026
  • Saturday, April 11, 2026

Link to learn more about Saturday Introductory Level Classes

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News / Announcements

Audio Description for Dance Workshops – Spring 2025

image is described at the end of the post

This series of five online workshops covers a variety of topics related to audio description for dance, and are designed not only as professional development for audio describers, but also as essential education for blind and visually impaired audiences, choreographers, dancers, movement educators, and administrators for arts presenting organizations. 

All workshops take place online via Zoom.

To register for any or all workshops, please write to info@darkroomballet.com as soon as possible to complete the registration process.

Saturday, April 12, 2025:  
How to Hire and Collaborate with a Professional Audio Describer (NEW!)


This workshop is designed to help prepare choreographers and arts administrators to effectively collaborate with a professional audio describer, ideally to integrate the audio describer as a full member of the production team. Audio describers will learn about their rights as professionals, the role of blind audio description consultants will be discussed, and models will be shared demonstrating how true artistic excellence can be achieved when all parties involved in the audio description process understand their role and purpose. 

Saturday, April 19, 2025:
Body Language, Movement Shorthand, and Mime for Blind Audiences

Although there are common cultural assumptions about popular body language and movement shorthand, it’s important to remember that they are all learned and not universally known! We’re going to break down some body language assumptions, find ways to integrate effective audio description, and explore the wonderfully hilarious world of mime and exaggerated body language.

Saturday, April 26, 2025:
Experimentation in Vocal Tonality for Audio Description for Dance 

Most audio description used to support television and film is recorded with a neutral tone of voice. However, we here in the Dark Room propose that dance is a very different art form that deserves a different approach to audio description. Be ready to listen to some interesting examples of audio description, practice using the voice expressively, and pair sound and movement together in artistically effective ways.

Saturday, May 3, 2025:
Yeah, But Was It Good? Learning How to Listen to Audio Description for Dance Critically  

Audio description for dance performances is still very rare, but that doesn’t mean that blind and visually impaired audiences should be satisfied when the audio description on offer is of low quality. Students are going to get to listen to many, many examples of audio description for dance, and talk about what works and what doesn’t work, and what we might change in order to improve it.

Saturday, May 10, 2025:
How to Watch Dance 2: an Audio Description Workshop for Audio Describers and Blind Audiences 

The second of the Dark Room’s “watch party” workshops (How to Watch Dance 1 took place in November 2024), as a community, we will research an audio described dance performance video, set our expectations and make predictions, watch a full-length performance together, and then share our critique of the audio description and the performance. We had a blast back in November watching The View from Here by Zaccho Dance Theatre; come and hone your critical listening skills!

On a dark background sprinkled with small illustrated stars, people appear at the bottom with different body types, dressed in colorful casual clothing while they move and dance.

Contrasting white and cream-colored text above reads:

DARK ROOM BALLET WITH KRISHNA WASHBURN

Audio Description for Dance

A SERIES OF 5 VIRTUAL WORKSHOPS

SATURDAYS FROM APRIL 12 TO MAY 10, 2025

ON ZOOM FROM 4 PM TO 6 PM (EASTERN/NEW YORK TIME)

MORE INFO/REGISTER AT LINK

or visit DarkRoomBallet.com

Categories
News / Announcements

No Diagram Anatomy Returns – February 2025

image described in post

Announcing a new series of three no diagram anatomy workshops open to all (with priority given to blind and visually impaired students), no prior experience required.

All workshops take place online via Zoom.

To register for any or all workshops, please write to info@darkroomballet.com as soon as possible to complete the registration process.

Saturday, February 8: The Dorsal Complex (Back Class)

This workshop will break down all of the anatomical structures of the back, including bones, connective tissue, and muscles, and analyze the full biomechanics of the dorsal complex, including how they move the arms and torso. One of the largest, most complex, and least understood regions of the human body demystified!

Saturday, February 15: The Somatosensory System (The Sense of Touch)

This workshop explains how the human sense of touch works, from the stimulation of the sensory nerve all the way to understanding and interpretation by the brain. Understand how to categorize and analyze the different types of touch sensation and how the nervous system receives them, and even try out some tactile illusions!

Saturday, February 22: The Pelvic Floor (The One We’ve All Been Waiting For!)

This workshop has a full breakdown of the skeletal and muscular structures that contribute to the pelvic floor and also the organs associated with this region of the human body. The pelvic floor has become a popular marketing topic for many pseudoscientific grifters looking to take advantage of dancers particularly — knowledge is power, and knowing the truth about this area of the body can keep you, your health, and your money much safer!

On a light blue background with some white areas, a continuous line drawing shows a person standing with their hands together.

Black text reads:


DARK ROOM BALLET WITH KRISHNA WASHBURN


NO DIAGRAM ANATOMY

3 classes online via Zoom

No experience necessary

Info/register:

darkroomballet.com

or

LINK IN BIO

Saturday, February 8: The Dorsal Complex

Saturday, February 15: The Somatosensory System

Saturday, February 22: The Pelvic Floor

Categories
News / Announcements

Audio Description for Dance Returns – November 2024

Sponsored by Movement Research, all workshops take place online via Zoom, on Saturdays from 4 PM to 6 PM (Eastern/New York Time)

To register for any or all of these workshops, please write to info@darkroomballet.com as soon as possible to complete the registration process.

Saturday, November 16, 2024:
How to Watch Dance – an Audio Description Workshop for Audio Describers and Blind Audiences (New!)

This workshop guides the participants through the entire process of researching and preparing to watch a dance performance, using that research to watch an audio described dance performance in a critical way, and making a group assessment about 1) whether the expectations formed through our research about the performance itself were fulfilled, and 2) whether the audio description of the performance was effective, accurate, and served the purpose of the performance. 


Saturday, November 23, 2024:
Narrative Components in Audio Description for Dance

One of the greatest challenges for audio describers of dance is balancing movement description with essential narrative components. While some dance companies provide narrative information about dance in a synopsis before the performance, we here in the Dark Room argue that the synopsis is inadequate to help blind and visually impaired audiences truly immerse themselves in the art. Learn how to connect story and movement through examples and creation.

Saturday, November 30, 2024:
Script Preparation Strategies for Audio Description for Dance – Multiple Pathways!

Where do audio description scripts come from? It depends! This workshop will discuss multiple approaches to getting started on an audio description script, depending on multiple factors: access to artists involved with the project, prior knowledge, type of audience, style of performance, timeframes, and so on and so forth. This is a great introduction to script writing for audio description novices, and a great opportunity for audio description fans to express themselves.