ABOUT US

CCDS offers professional one-year education programmes for career oriented contemporary dancers.
The Pre-education programme has existed since 2005 and the Post-graduate progamme since 2012.

At CCDS our goal is to educate the strongest dancers in the world! Read more about the school on our website.

fredag den 9. december 2011

A week in the world of dance, by intern Emma Arnoldi

















In week 46 I completed an internship at CCDS.

My week at Copenhagen Contemporary Dance School, was a week of challenges and experiences.

The first day was very quiet. The dancers discussed their educational plans just like any other dedicated students. But their plans were far from the world I am used to where students talk of A-levels followed by university. In their world there were dreams and passions of being a professional dancer. Morten Innstrand told the dancers how to write their motivational letters and they were all ears.

The first day I had to get used to the fact that only English was spoken in class, as the school is very international with students from places like Iceland and Greece. But I soon got used to hearing 5 different languages each day!

Tuesday, after strapping on my camera and cycling to CCDS I was blown away by the dancers' skills in their morning ballet class. Neither my camera, nor my eyes were still for even a moment.

After ballet was a change of genre. Hardcore contemporary dance, which I bravely made an attempt to follow, dancing until the sweat poured. I gave up quite quickly and I hereby apologise to all that saw me dance that day. And I humbly bow to you all for not having collapsed yet, because that was so hard and so difficult! However I did manage to take some really great pictures.


Wednesday I woke up to an experience which every dancer must go through a thousand times every day. I had danced no more than 10 minutes and my back was completely beat. An old back injury of mine could be partially to blame, but nonetheless I felt seriously out of shape as I wrote to one of the dancers to say that I was staying home to edit my photos.

Thursday was yet another day of fantastic dancing. The whole week simply merged together, constantly surrounded as I was by these highly passionate and skilled people. And once again I was struck with silent awe by these wonderful dancers and their amazing teachers.

Besides the dancing, one of the things I noticed during my week at CCDS was the feeling of togetherness among the dancers. It was obvious that they had become one large family that cared for one another. I have often imagined that a dance education would be a place of competitiveness rather than friendship, but this prejudice was brought to shame at CCDS. I cannot imagine finding a more wonderful and safe working environment anywhere.

Friday I showed my pictures to the dancers. They seemed appreciative of my efforts and happy with the results. My results from this week weren’t just a stack of wonderful pictures, but also a bag full of experiences.

I had been a little nervous when I came to the school on the first day, but both teachers and dancers gave me such a warm welcome.

So CCDS: Thank you for a wonderful week. I look forward to following all of the wonderful dancers when they reach the stars!


All photos by Emma Arnoldi