“Memory lives in my heart Tension in my chest Breath shallow But I can touch him."
"Moving Kinship is an example of the value that (European) collaboration within the arts can have. By connecting dance with themes such as care, feminism, and collective memory, this project offers a new perspective on how art and dance can contribute to well-being and social change. For the Dutch Dance Days, where we continuously explore the intersections between dance, health, and society, Moving Kinship is an inspiring example of how artistic imagination and social responsibility can strengthen one another."
Claudia Laenen, Dutch Dance Days
Rooted in Rooted in Beatrice Allegranti’s Moving Kinship® feminist and intersectional choreographic practice, I Carry These Moments in My Body reclaims dementia as a lived, relational experience shaped by gender, culture, and diaspora.
“I keep my fire. I cook with sambal, turmeric, galangal. I feel Indonesian.”
I Carry These Moments in My Body is a 30-minute trauma-informed dance
performance and accompanying immersive installation centering the lived experiences of people living with rare onset dementia and their close relatives. Developed from interview-conversations at Warm Thuis care home, this work fuses dance, spoken word, original music and animated illustration into a collective act of memory, resistance, and renewal.
The piece embraces the sensory intelligence of bodies and the deep entanglement between humans, nature, and animal kin. It invites a form of collective remembering that is not only sensory and political, but radically more-than-human.
“Too often, dominant social and medical narratives of ageing, illness, and care frame dementia as an individualistic condition. Our collaboration with people living with young onset dementia foregrounds instead complex identities—gendered, racialised, and diasporic—that shape how memory is held, lost, and reimagined in the body and throu
“Too often, dominant social and medical narratives of ageing, illness, and care frame dementia as an individualistic condition. Our collaboration with people living with young onset dementia foregrounds instead complex identities—gendered, racialised, and diasporic—that shape how memory is held, lost, and reimagined in the body and through our embodied interactions. Their testimonies directly inform this work.”
Beatrice Allegranti
This is more than a performance—it is a call to empathy, to everyday acts of relational justice and solidarity. A powerful testament to the capacity of dance and choreographic practice to honour embodied memory and imagine new ways of living, remembering, and caring—together.
“I experienced this inspired performance. Job and Grace master the art of not merely appearing as dancers on stage, but as deeply empathetic professionals who are used to engaging with people with dementia, both professionally and personally. Memories, loss, and joy are embodied from the very first moment. The spoken word and the images are at once complementary and meaningful in their own right. As a viewer, I am naturally drawn into my own personal story.”
Annemieke Van Duinhoven, Audience Member
“What worked so well was the trust — in each other and with the people living with dementia that we worked with. Everyone felt safe, and that made it possible to go deeper.”
Grace Bellel, Dance Artist & Dance Educator
“I realized, on a bodily level, how my white privilege works in small, micro ways. That realization has deepened — and it will change my practice.”
Job Cornelissen, Dance Artist & Dance Movement Therapist
“For me, this experience deepened how I understand intersectionality — the links between class, race, gender, and access to therapy. That will stay with me in my future practice.”
Ida Inga, Moving Kinship Netherlands Intern, Codarts Rotterdam
ILLUSTRATION REPORTAGE
Moving Kinship NeTHERLANDS TEAM
CREDITS
Artistic Direction & Choreography
Beatrice Allegranti
Dancers
Grace Bellel
Job Cornelissen
Text & Dramaturgy
Beatrice Allegranti
Music & Composition
Robert Howat
Videography
Alexander Lopera
Reportage Illustration
Neil Max Emmanuel
Producer
Bewogen Werken
Dutch Dance Days
Marketing & PR
Bewoge Werken
Dutch Dance Days
Graphics
Nee Nee Creative
Translation & Interpretation
Grace Bellel
Job Cornelissen
Lighting Design
Dutch Dance Days
Performance Photography
Jona Harnischmacher
Location Photography
Beatrice Allegranti
Livestream Cameras
Alexander Lopera
Neil Max Emmanuel
Livestream Editor
Marc Ploum
Moving Kinship Netherlands Intern
Ida Inga, Codarts, Rotterdam
With special thanks to all the project participants from Warm Thuis.