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The Danse Meets Dance (DMD) Festival is an annual contemporary dance festival that originated in 2001.

It was first
organised and run by the French Cultural Centre Lagos until 2004 when
the centre closed. The Festival is now being handled by the French
Cultural Centre Abuja, Alliance Francaise Lagos and Goethe Insitute
Nigeria with technical support from Blackroots International.
Additional support also comes from the French Embassy and
CulturesFrance, the agency of the ministries of Foreign Affairs and
Culture and Communications responsible for international cultural
exchanges.

The festival aims
to encourage professional dance in Nigeria and give Nigerian dancers
exposure on the international scene. The festival features performances
from local and foreign dance companies; and also workshops for
professional and amateur dancers.

Over the years, DMD
has successively served as a launch-pad onto the local and
international scene for several indigenous dance companies, one of
which is the popular Ijodee dance group helmed by award winning dancer,
Dayo Liadi.

With the calibre of
foreign and indigenous dance professionals that have featured at the
festivals, it is a wonder that DMD has earned little or no public
recognition so far. Its aim to encourage dance in Nigeria, however, has
led to an increased awareness of contemporary dance within mostly art
circles and the proliferation of dance companies in Nigeria. According
to Gboyega Adetona, the creative director of the Festival, as many as
20 dance companies have risen in Lagos alone thanks to DMD.

For this year like
in past years, efforts were made to get sponsorships, with little
success. For a “festival”, the event gets very few participants in the
way of audience. The organisers are able boast of 2000 people at last
year’s grand performance show, which held on the last day of the
festival. This year, the normally week-long event has been shortened to
four days, due to this lack of corporate sponsorship and public
participation.

For a country that
can boast huge music and dance reality shows, mostly culled from
foreign franchises, it is a wonder that an indigenously organised event
such as this would have to suffer interest. In the United States, the
TV show ‘So You Think You Can Dance’ has been hailed for encouraging
dance (especially contemporary dance) culture in that country. The show
has helped to bring together dance practitioners across America that
help to develop workshops aimed at serving those, kids and adults,
interested in the dance profession.

For a country, that
loves to emulate, one would not be surprised if a production company
decides to import that franchise for local consumption sometime in the
future. This would be sad indeed, as there is already a foundation to
build on with Dance Meets Danse, if only someone would come forward and
start building.

The 10th edition of the Danse Meets Dance festival takes places this
year from the 1st to 4th December 2010 at the Arts Theatre University
of Lagos, Akoka; and the French School, Victoria Island. It is free for
all comers.