Scratch Night | Thursday 3 April | 19:00-21:00 | £10/8 | Book Now
An exclusive first look at works-in-progress by some of Scotland’s leading dance artists, co-curated by Hidden Door and hosted by Dance Base Artistic Director Tony Mills.
Our Spring Scratch Night will feature work by Oxana Banshikova and Kirsten Newell; Taine McKinstray; Paul Michael Henry and Pik Kei Wong; and Florence Logan and Romi Sarfaty.
The Dance Base Scratch Night is a unique platform in Edinburgh which brings live dance work to audiences and creates a supportive platform for dance and movement artists to try out ideas on the stage, experiment with an audience and share their work with their peers, the sector and the public.
The evening will be hosted by Dance Base Artistic Director Tony Mills, who will create a safe space for artists to receive feedback from you, the audience, through a relaxed facilitated conversations.
Along with space in the theatre for conversation during the show, there will also be drinks in the interval and at the end of the show, providing space for audiences and artists to connect.
Let’s move. Book your tickets now.
BODIES IN REBELLION by Pik Kei Wong and Paul Michael Henry
Where political suppression meets personal liberation in a dance on the knife-edge of freedom. Acclaimed artists Pik Kei Wong and Paul Michael Henry merge Hong Kong’s stifled voices with Irish colonial history and neurological diversity in this experimental performance. Witness metamorphosis through Butoh Fu – the Japanese “dance of darkness” — as bodies transform into landscapes of resistance.
Moments of surreal beauty collide with unexpected humour as fumbling tango dancers struggle to read forbidden messages. Original music by Paul Michael Henry elevates this journey through cosmic and cultural narratives.
Developed at Dance Base and The Work Room residencies, this premiere invites audiences to reflect on their own experiences of constraint — participation embraced but never demanded.
“We realised that challenging political suppression begins with confronting how our voices are limited in daily life,… The body remembers what the mind is forced to forget.”
Image Credit: Paul Michael Henry
More about the artists
Pik Kei Wong
Glasgow-based dance creator Pik Kei Wong brings 14 years of experience from Hong Kong’s dance scene, relocating to Scotland in 2023 amid political shifts. Her award-winning work “Bird-Watching” received 5 stars at Edinburgh Fringe 2023, while recent pieces like “Vermin” (2024) explore audience interaction and co-creation.
Paul Michael Henry
Paul Michael Henry is an acclaimed dancer, musician & writer based in Glasgow. Their work springs from Butoh dance, punk rock and ritual, and is performed all over the world. Michael is also Artistic Director and creator of UNFIX, an evolving and experimental festival platforming ecologically committed performance, dance, music, film and discussion.
Lamb by Taine McKinstray
“Beasts of the most savage nature have proved more mild and gentle to me, than you; nor could I have been entrusted to more faithless hands.” – Ariadne to Theseus, The Heroides, Ovid.
Descending from the intriguing tales hidden behind the grander feats of Greek Heroes, ‘Lamb’ explores the suffering, unconditional love and the cathartic victories of women in Greek Mythology. Turning the term ‘Sacrificial Lamb’ on its head, ‘Lamb’ touches on the unappreciated acts of women in Greek Mythology, whose male counterparts received all adoration for quests that the women had a significant role in.
In this current version, Taine explores the specific tale of Ariadne. We see a girl abandoned by the man she loved and left to die upon an unknown island. We see her despair, her confusion and anger over being left behind after everything she did – betraying her family and helping Theseus kill the Minotaur. And we see her eventual acceptance over her ascension to divinity. Letting go of her mortal ties by cutting the string that binds her to Theseus, Ariadne realises there’s more to her tale than just being another sacrifice in a man’s honoured story.
Image Credit: Elly Welford
More about Taine McKinstray
Taine McKinstray is an early-stage career multidisciplinary artist based in Fife. Exploring a predominantly physical theatre based practice, her interest lies in investigating existing stories, particularly within the genres of comedy and tragedy; her work often tipping on the fine line between both. Her current research revolves around working with characters and narratives from various forms of existing media, taking inspiration from the images and text of stories that she is personally drawn to – specifically investigating mythologies, morally complex figures and archetypal images.
By interweaving text and movement, she creates work that bends linear narrative patterns and pursues the understanding of character, and recognises how stories that are often more abstract verge upon the edge of the real world. Whilst her work is often geared towards fiction, she questions how these stories are relevant to today’s society and how they can reflect upon real life issues – whether that be autobiographical to her and her collaborators, or applicable to the world as a whole.
It takes place in the Womb by Baby (Romi Sarfaty and Florence Logan)
I wouldn’t want it to be perfect, wouldn’t we have to stop if it was perfect?
Inspired by female friendship and the phenomenon of mothering, specifically the way touch is used as a form of care and of communication, “It takes place in the Womb” works with platonic touch as its core choreographic principle – transforming ideas of feminine care into a distinct movement style. In a world that promotes efficiency in relationships, we choose to find all the ways to hug instead.
This duet is antisocial and ‘aimless’ in its tenderness, pace and proximity, radical in its sweetness and drunk with hope. We hope our unconditional commitment to closeness encourages more unashamed acts of platonic affection, and pushes the audience to question their cynicism when faced with a performance void of conflict.
This work seeks to distill the human need for affection in its most extreme form by creating a world where only touch exists. This performance transforms every space into a womb, even if it doesn’t seem like one.
Image credit: Euan Munro
More about Baby
Baby is an emerging artistic duo of wonky, melodramatic and desperately loving movement-based performance. We’re currently working on a research project titled Radical Touch, which consists of two aspects: “It takes place in the Womb”, and a series of community workshops titled “Touch Tales”. Inspired by the unblemished love of girlhood, the profound yet practical touch of mothering and experiences of feminine care, these workshops aim to share and celebrate stories where touch communicated something that words couldn’t.
Looking outside and seeing the violent disregard and carelessness of everyday touch, the loneliness crisis, the alienation and consequential aggression caused by insufficient and artificial forms of online connection, and the heightened fear of intimacy since the pandemic – it’s evident that we need to relearn how to care collectively, how to touch radically. We are communally failing to provide the touch and affection we need, failing to admit that we need it. Our work is in response to this need.
Duality by Oxana Banshikova and Kirsten Newell (Cosmic Dance)
Duality is a contemporary Bharatanatyam duet that challenges traditional expectations of the dance form.
What is real, and what is illusion? What is right, and what is wrong?
While duality suggests opposition, it also signifies coexistence. This work subverts the conventional solo format, embracing collaboration and interdependence to reflect values of care, balance, and shared experience. The choreography explores the relationship between technology and spirituality, adapting Bharatanatyam’s rich heritage to modern concepts while preserving its spiritual depth.
Image credit: Oxana Banshikova
More about the artists
Oxana Banshikova and Kirsten Newell are both prominent Bharatanatyam artists living in Scotland. Under the Cosmic Dance umbrella they have joined their efforts in growing and popularizing Bharatanatyam in its traditional and modern form in Scotland.
As Kalakshetra graduates and trained under the best artists in this field, they share 20 years of teaching and performing experience.
Oxana and Kirsten are striving to promote and grow innovative and high quality South Asian Dance through their collaborative and independent work in UK and abroad.
Support Us
Dance Base is a charity with a mission to encourage and celebrate the potential for dance in everyone. We use the power of dance to improve people’s health and wellbeing, and we support professional dance artists at all stages of their careers. We’re grateful for the generous support of out funders and donors.
