In this episode, Oni Blecher will be sharing an interview with Vanessa Marian. Vanessa is a dancer, choreographer and movement director, involved in many large scale and award winning projects. 
As a dancer, Vanessa started with a foundation in Indian classical dance, she has also trained in many different dance styles across New York, Paris, Berlin, London, Tokyo, Brazil, India and regional Australia with a particular focus in street dance and the way it is born outside of the dance studio context, often by an oppressed people in reaction to political and socio-economic turmoil.

In 2016, Vanessa founded Groove Therapy, aimed at making the mental and physical health benefits of dance accessible to all walks of life. Groove Therapy has brought the goodness of dance to at-risk youth, Indigenous communities, people with dementia, refugee girls and the average person, using the political and healing foundations that these street dance styles are built upon and mindfully appropriating it in new communities to help spark global conversation and cultural understanding.  

Last year, Vanessa became a mother for the first time. As an woman with Indian heritage, born in the United Arab Emirates and migrating to Australia at five, Vanessa has a keen eye for social, cultural, and political observation, pregnancy, birth, postpartum and parenthood became Vanessa’s next landscape for intrigue in the way birth and motherhood can be seen from a large variation of perspectives including her own. Vanessa will be sharing her perspectives on ritual, culture, and race as it is pertinent to her experience and  background. This includes care from her parents, what she saw as important when looking for birth support, and so much more. 

We Loved this conversation. We always love to hear from you. Let us know you found it or what you found interesting or leave us a comment, review, or rating. You can emails us as well ! At [email protected]