ABSTRACT
This section aims to demonstrate how important it is to use professional dance works as exemplars in teaching dance composition. In all other arts, students learn from the practice and products of past and present artists. Over the past thirty years, there has been a welcome increase in dance artists’ work in education. There is certainly much to be gained by students from this live experience, in addition to the occasionally funded theatre visit. Furthermore, students in university are often privileged to work with lecturers who have themselves had professional experience as choreographers or dancers – or both. In this sector, perhaps more than any other, the teaching/learning of dance composition focuses strongly on the work of artists in the field.
