Dance a little, a lot, till you drop? In its third issue, Cahiers de danse explores the performative power of twisting movements and frenetic bodies. In three sections - “That’s mad!”, “A Streak of Madness” and “Broken Dances”, the magazine revives the spirit of the dancing plague. On stage, contorted movements inspire techniques for navigating whirlwinds of emotions, from fainting with laughter or eyes brimming with tears; whilst bodies in crisis reveal their subversive and critical power.

Sitting at the junction of psychiatric discourse, artistic processes, and care practices, Cahiers de danse aims to highlight the lived experience of those who feel these states and who dance them. Whether they are patients, caregivers, artists, or therapists, their testimonials invite us to lean into our mad bodies and the unexpected poetics of choreas that express them.

× That’s mad!
• Workless Dancing. Pathological Dances as Performance for the Stage | Felicia McCarren
• Intensities – On Women’s Excessive Gesturality, from Choreomania to Yvonne Rainer | Johanna Renard

× A Streak of Madness
• Marginal Bodies Center Stage | Mette Ingvartsen
• Sculpting Twisted Movements | Fanny Brouyaux
• Dear Madman | Volmir Cordeiro

× Broken Dances
• Dancing Crisis – on a Dance Experiment in an Inhospitable Environment | Christian Daclinat & Marina Ledrein
• What spatial approaches in dance, for madness? | Violeta Salvatierra