for our third year Dance Production unit, we created a piece for our Launchpad show called Growing Pains, drawing upon the pressures of being 20 years old, having to navigate newly adult life whilst yearning to turn back time - unpacking the comfort and safety of we associate with our childhood. we worked tirelessly to create a piece that i truly adore. alongside sylvie & rai, we curated the lighting design, costumes & marketing and i edited the soundscape for the entire piece. we devised, choreographed, and produced the whole show from pitching individual ideas to performing the piece on stage. eternally grateful to sylvie & rai as they were the dream team to work with & i am beyond proud of what we created; i absolutely adored performing with them in this project as we created a piece that was so personal & authentic to us. i’m so proud of how hard we worked & how much of ourselves we poured into the final outcome.

the thing i enjoyed most about this process is sharing our personal stories along our creative journey. i really enjoyed connecting with Rai and Sylvie and learning more about their understanding of nostalgia. i also loved the conversation it opens about how we all felt when we turned twenty and the discussions around nostalgia! i found both vulnerability and passion in our work, which was a really important and impactful part of the process for me. i also think this is why our piece feels so heartfelt, it's real and raw; it’s how we feel about being twenty right now! ultimately our work comes from a place of security, knowing we trust each other when exploring such personal themes.

when i look back over my childhood I miss the little things, and the abundance of joy that came along with them. i miss all the small moments that now feel so big; bedtime stories with my dad - he would read me & my brother the Tintin comics, my mum & i filling the weekends with art and crafts projects, building sandcastles on the beach with my grampy, breakfast time with my whole family around the dining table together, easter egg hunts in my granny's garden, making up little dances on my dining room floor and teaching them to my friends in the playground the next day, and so on and so on. everything felt so comforting and joyful. i miss the simplicity of it all.