In the first part of a conversation with past and current curators of the nottdance festival, Andi Johnson, De Montfort PhD student and Organisational Archive Researcher, focuses on the festival's rich history and its significant role in shaping the dance landscape in Nottingham and beyond.

nottdance is a festival of extraordinary dance, presenting choreographic ideas and works from across the city of Nottingham and around the world, asking "What can dance be?"

The festival has always embraced experimentation, inviting radical perspectives and listening to artists working in ways that don’t fit the traditional, choreographic mould.

In the 2025 edition, nottdance asks: How do we each perceive time? What does it feel like to belong? And whose stories are being told? Inhabiting the city’s theatres, galleries, shopping centres and outdoor spaces, the works reflect and celebrate our city and the world in which we live, with and for our communities near and far.

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Andi Johnson (They/Them) is the Organisational Archive Researcher for Fabric. Alongside this, Andi is a PhD student at De Montfort University in Leicester.

Bill Gee (He/Him) works as a programmer, festival director, project producer, strategist, and researcher specialising in arts in the public space. He’s been doing something similar for the past 38 years since starting his professional life in the East Midlands at the end of the 1980s. Bill currently works with Activate; 101 Outdoor Arts; Bloomsbury Festival; Nature Calling; Jyll Bradley; R&D Studios, and as Access Support worker for Julian Rudd.

Jane Greenfield (She/Her) has had an extensive arts career spanning over 30 years. Beginning in the mid-80s as Dance Animateur in Norfolk and Derbyshire, she went on to work at Nottingham Playhouse and Nottinghamshire Next Stage. In 1994 she became Director of Dance 4 and two years later, the Director of nottdance.

From Dance4, Jane broadened her curatorial practice and worked across the live/performance and visual art sectors, including for Home Live Art and the National Trust's Trust New Art programme. Currently she works as Creative Producer for Culture Creative, an international arts & events company working in the realms of large-scale outdoor events and Winter light trails.

Nicky Napier (She/Her) has over thirty years of experience in the dance and performance sector and works in a freelance capacity as a curator, executive producer and dramaturg. She is currently interim Director at Independent Dance and was previously Head of Dance and Performance at the Southbank Centre, programming dance and performance across the entire site. Nicky trained at Trinity Laban, has an MA Dramaturgy from Birkbeck and an MA Popular Culture from the Open University, and was Artistic Director at Dance4 and the nottdance Festival from 2004-2008. She is currently Chair of Ben Duke’s Lost Dog and will shortly become Co-Chair of Chishenhale Dance Space.

Paul Russ (He/Him) is Artistic Director and CEO of FABRIC, the dance development organisation based in the Midlands, UK. Paul was Chair of Nottingham 2023, the City’s European Capital of Culture bid and Chair of Nottingham Strategic Cultural Partnership. Paul has held many non-Executive roles in third sector organisations and has participated in international advisory panels and forums.

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Music by Tom Harris listeningspace.xyz/

Edited by Steve Woodward at podcastingeditor.com

Fabric is an Arts Council England, National Portfolio Organisation.