On the opening night of the 2026 Festival, Dance Umbrella announces its Guest Curator and Curatorial Fellow for 2027, as part of its landmark Sightlines: Diversifying Curatorial Stewardship programme. The 2027 Guest Curator will be Amy Louise Lawrence and the 2027 Curatorial Fellow will be Ray Young.
From left to right Top row: Rachel Evans, Sightlines Project Manager; Freddie Opoku-Addaie, Artistic Director & Co-CEO of Dance Umbrella; Antonia Beck, Senior Producer: Artist Development at The Lowry; Anthony Missen, Chief Executive & Creative Director at DanceEast; Paul Russ, Artistic Director & Chief Executive at Fabric; Tania Wilmer, Executive Director & Co-CEO at Dance Umbrella. Seated: Ray Young, Curatorial Fellow; Amy Louise Lawrence, Guest Curator; Betsy Gregory, AEROWAVES board member and Startup Forum Director. Photo by Roswitha Chesher
Sightlines is Dance Umbrella’s major multi‑year initiative (2026–2028) designed to transform curatorial leadership within the UK and international dance ecology. The project responds to a clearly evidenced sector gap: the absence of visible, supported career pathways for curators — particularly Black/Brown Global Majority, predominantly female‑identifying and non-binary practitioners — and the resulting lack of diversity within those who shape artistic programmes, narratives and decision‑making.
Ray Young (left) and Amy Louise Lawrence (right), credit Roswitha Chesher
The Guest Curator role involves developing and delivering a main event as part of Dance Umbrella’s 2027 Festival, offering Amy Louise Lawrence access to sustained mentoring and professional development opportunities, including a four-day residency at DanceEast in January 2027, and Aerowaves Start Up programme for emerging dance presenters in Limerick in April 2027. As part of the role, Amy will work with the Sightlines steering group partners to ensure a part of her work can be toured to a partner venue.
The role of Curatorial Fellow is a 14 month paid professional development programme which involves shadowing key members of the Dance Umbrella team at key points in the planning and development of the festival. Through this role, Ray Young will participate in national and international professional development and networking opportunities brokered through Dance Umbrella’s networks — including the Aerowaves’ Startup Forum for emerging dance presenters, which takes place during the Spring Forward Festival (14-17th April 2027 in Limerick, Ireland). They will access the Dance Festival Network Europe’s Visiting Artist programme, offering creative exchange and networking at host European festivals, as well as building relationships with the Sightlines steering group partners — Aerowaves, DanceEast, Lowry and FABRIC International, and Dance Umbrella’s festival venue partners.
Sightlines aims to create structural, long‑term change by widening who curates, how curation is practiced, and who has access to networks, resources and influence. The programme builds on Dance Umbrella’s sector‑facing research (2023/24), which identified five recurring barriers to diverse curatorial leadership: lack of pathways, undervaluing of lived experience, unequal access to networks, freelance precarity, and limited spaces for honest dialogue about power and representation.
Artistic Director and Co-CEO of Dance Umbrella Freddie Opoku-Addaie said:
“Curatorial practices, both local and global, have implicit cultural rules that are too often shaped by a few, creating preconceived pathways and networks. This means that many talented people are not given the opportunities, support, resources or time to flex their muscles within the discipline and explore what other types of nuanced care means to them through their lived expertise.
On behalf of the Sightlines partners, I am delighted to welcome Amy Louise Lawrence and Ray Young to the programme, and to support their approaches to curation while building relationships and networks that can sustain their work well beyond the project.”
Curated by Artistic Director and Co-CEO Freddie Opoku-Addaie, Dance Umbrella is London’s annual international dance festival. Dance Umbrella 2026 opens tonight with Mamela Nyamza’s THE HERD/LESS at Sadler’s Wells East and runs until 27 October with a wide range of both in-person and online events from internationally acclaimed artists, which bring the best of international contemporary dance to London audiences.
The Sightlines: Diversifying Cultural Stewardship programme is made possible by a major funding award from Arts Council England supported by National Lottery and the British Council.