The RAD welcomed Queen Elizabeth to open its new headquarters in Battersea 1974, and the Fonteyn Centre Studios in 1990. We were honoured to be involved in her 90th birthday celebrations: Dame Darcey Bussell performed at this special event alongside RAD teachers and students.

The Queen’s patronage has been hugely important in supporting the RAD in its mission to advocate for benefits of dance and the arts in communities all around the world.

Last month, I was working at an exploitative summer job, earning less than minimum wage, and doing over 70 hours a week. My team had just gone on strike when I was invited by Dance Gazette to write an article about what makes a happy organisation. It was a euphoric moment for me. I couldn’t believe someone cared about my opinions on happiness at work when my own job was making me so miserable.

As adults, most of us spend a vast chunk of our waking hours working, commuting, or getting ready for work. A recent poll commissioned by the Association of Accounting Technicians  estimates that the average worker in the UK will spend 84,171 hours working over the course of their career. So, when we ask what makes a happy organisation, really, we are asking what makes a happy life.

These thoughts are especially relevant to the RAD because Tim Arthur, the new chief executive, sent out two surveys – one each to RAD teachers and members – to get a ‘temperature check,’ as he puts it, for how people feel about the RAD. ‘I wanted it to be warts and all,’ he explains. ‘I really wanted to hear where are the frustrations, what are the bits that we’re not doing that we could do better – or that people would like us to change.’ For the past couple of years, Arthur has been training to become a psychotherapist, and going to therapy himself as part of the course. It has influenced his approach to life – ‘I’m much more chilled out,’ he beams, recalling how he used to work ‘huge hours, and not necessarily productively.’ He is mindful of the ‘trauma of the last couple of years’ for RAD members, bearing in mind the toll covid-19 has taken on people’s mental health, and is keen to do what he can to support them through the global cost of living crisis.

But the RAD can’t solve the world’s problems and Arthur is all too aware of the challenges of running a global organisation; ‘how do you make sure that somebody who is a sole operator in a country somewhere quite a long way away still feels connected?’ he asks. It is a concern for him, and much thought went into what he calls the ‘health and happiness’ surveys. The team are still working through the responses, and Arthur estimates it will be about 18 months before members begin to feel any meaningful change. But he wants to learn from these surveys and make them an annual occurrence.

To gain an understanding of what a happy company looks like, I spoke to Magnus Falk, Chief Information Officer of Zoom, a virtual meeting software with which many of us have become familiar since the start of the pandemic. For the past three years, Zoom has topped rankings of companies with the happiest employees, so I asked Falk what makes their workers so happy. ‘You need a very clear purpose of your role within the organisation,’ he tells me.

‘There’s that great story of the janitor who worked at NASA, and when asked what his role was, he said, “I’m helping put someone on the moon.”’ It’s a sweet joke, but he means it. ‘I think people are only happy if someone in the organisation cares what they’re doing,’ he muses. ‘If no one cares about you, you can really get unhappy very quickly.’

According to Falk, happiness is the core principle upon which Zoom was established. The founder, Eric Yuan, left a six-figure salary tech job because he was unhappy, and felt that his customers were not happy either. He set up Zoom to make people happy. According to Falk, Yuan is a ‘servant leader’: his meetings are based on listening and asking colleagues for their input, and he cares about their feedback. 

It seems then, that Arthur is doing the right thing with the RAD – he calls this his ‘listening phase.’ But he feels the weight of responsibility. ‘If people don’t see change happen, then that’s almost worse,’ he worries. 

To try to understand what positive change looks like in the workplace, I spoke to an expert. Laura Giurge is Assistant Professor in Behavioural Science at the London School of Economics.

Her research focuses on the culture of work in a holistic way and asks what we can do to improve our lives both at work and outside of it.

Interestingly, in contrast to Falk, Giurge doesn’t think a sense of purpose is necessarily a priority. ‘I don’t think that any one element is the most important,’ she reflects, ‘priorities can depend on the person. Where they are in their career, what type of organisation they’re working for, there’s all these contextual factors.’ Perhaps there is no clear-cut answer, but all three of my interviewees agree that happiness at work is linked to people – Giurge cites the saying, ‘people don’t leave organisations, they leave their boss’ and that this is backed by the research: ‘the people we work with, in particular our direct managers, have a really big influence on how happy we are at work.’

Falk and Giurge also have different views on flexible working. ‘Flexibility is a kind of modern construct,’ Falk considers. ‘Post pandemic, you have all the flexibility of where, when and how you work, which is really good.’ Giurge’s research, however, shows that although it is convenient to have a job which works around your life, flexibility isn’t always a good thing. ‘There’s a lot of over-positive buzz around flexibility,’ she laments. ‘There’s so much diversity of preferences and work types nowadays, and there’s less structure.’ 

According to Giurge, it is important that we impose structure and boundaries in our work and communicate those with our colleagues. She stresses that small changes can make a big difference – for example,  if we send non-urgent emails outside of work hours, we should make it clear to the recipient that we do not expect them to answer right away. ‘I can say that I tend to respond fast, or that I’m not available between x and y. Trying to enforce those norms can go a long way.’

For many in the creative industries, work does not mean a simple 9-5 job, and since the start of the pandemic, dance has taken a hit. But interestingly, Giurge points out that for dancers and dance teachers, ‘it’s beneficial that you can only do your work in certain locations – a studio imposes a certain structure.

Once you leave that physical location, you could disconnect from work and really engage in life outside.’ Whilst this may be true, the work of a dance practitioner is much more than just what we do in the studio – there might be admin, planning, marketing or a whole host of other things that demand our attention outside the studio. 

But it’s not only the culture of workplaces that is important to our happiness. Arthur tells me that dancing can put us in what psychotherapists call a ‘flow state.’ He defines this as ‘a state that people get in when they’re transported by an activity. So, if you are playing piano, or you’re knitting, or you’re dancing, your brain goes into a certain state, where you almost become unaware of time and space, and you’re just in the moment – very present.’ From a mental health perspective, he says, flow states have been shown to be hugely beneficial and have a long-term impact. To my surprise, he tells me that doctors now prescribe activities like dance classes or gardening to help with mental health issues like depression and anxiety. They call it ‘social prescribing – a method of helping people with their physical and mental health outside of medical interventions.’

Many different things contribute to creating happy organisations – people need to feel listened to and cared for, as well as being able to separate work from life. But, crucially for RAD members, it seems that one of the most important things is to do something that puts you in the moment, that makes you feel present and that brings you joy. And if doctors are prescribing dance, it suggests what RAD members have always known –that it must be one of the greatest sources of happiness.

Read

Tim Arthur speaks to Dance Gazette

Ella Satin is a freelance performing arts critic. Their specialism is theatre, but she also writes about dance, comedy, film and music.

Ana Latese is an editorial and narrative illustrator based in North Carolina. analatese.com

When Lindsay Ellman-Brown moved from Harare in Zimbabwe to begin a new life teaching ballet in Sydney, Australia there were certain things she’d say that would cause her students great confusion: ‘When I was choreographing with little ones I’d tell them to stop as if they were at the red robot,’ was one. Vikki Allport’s new teaching career in Acapulco, Mexico followed an upbringing in northern England that meant becoming accustomed to the stifling 36-degree heat in her Mexican ballet studio and regular bouts of ‘Montezuma’s revenge’ from the spicy food. When Shae Mowen first came to Sydney from her home in Papua New Guinea she needed to acquaint herself with buses for the first time. And after growing up in a little fishing village in Iceland, Bryndís Einarsdóttir was delighted to discover the reverence Americans in her new hometown of Los Angeles held for classical ballet, a style of dance that didn’t even exist in her Icelandic village.

Moving to a new home can be exciting, a time of fresh beginnings and new surrounds. But it can also be daunting, and when the move involves migrating to a country and a job teaching in a culture and language that is completely foreign, it adds an extra layer of complexity. (‘Robot’, for the uninitiated, is a common South African name for traffic lights).

When Shae Mowen’s parents moved from Australia to the small New Guinean town of Madang for work the infrastructure was basic. ‘They lived on a little island and went by canoe with kerosene lamps. I spoke pidgin English because that’s what the local people spoke,’ recalls Mowen, who was born there. When she was five a local policeman moved to the area with his wife, a dancer, so Mowen and her younger sister began to learn ballet. After moving to Port Moresby she learnt from an Australian RAD-trained teacher. ‘We were dancing in the high school hall which had no walls, completely open air, how fabulous is that!’ As a teen Mowen was flown to Sydney for ballet exams. It was an eye-opener. ‘It was somewhat daunting having grown up in Port Moresby,’ she says, ‘I’d never even caught a bus.’ Nevertheless, she would go on to become an RAD teacher herself, resulting in a milestone 65 year-affiliation with the organisation.

Vikki Allport’s move from northern England to Mexico was similarly revelatory. ‘Think Billy Elliot and coal miners – then I suddenly found myself in the land of jetsetters and Hollywood, working as an extra in movies, choreographing for Mexican popstars and appearing in pop videos,’ she says. ‘I also met Nureyev in Acapulco – I offered my studios for his rehearsals and got to chat to him backstage on his final tour.’

Allport had been dancing in Spain and accompanied her dance captain to Mexico where she planned to go for three months. She ended up staying 25 years, marrying a local, starting a family and opening a youth ballet school after completing her RAD teaching diploma via distance education. While aspects of her teaching life were comfortingly familiar, others took some getting used to. ‘Teaching was much the same as in the UK except I had to learn all the words for parts of the body in Spanish,’ she says [today she tutors for the RAD in Spanish]. ‘The studios had no aircon, just big ceiling fans and it was so hot, usually between 33 and 36 degrees centigrade. By the time the students had warmed up their leotards were soaking in sweat. On Saturdays we’d all end up in the swimming pool after class.’

No matter which direction you move – small town to international city or vice versa – there will always be adjustments to make in a new home. For Lindsay Ellman-Brown, much of her new life in Australia was a relief after the political and social upheaval in Zimbabwe. ‘I loved Sydney. It was very different. Zimbabwe was struggling politically and economically and in Australia it was safe, you could turn on the tap and get clean drinking water and you could get everything you needed,’ she says. But she was homesick, and the move to Australia to be closer to her mother meant leaving friends, family and a familiar lifestyle. ‘It wasn’t easy. Although we all speak English the culture was very different and I knew nothing about the political history. In Harare you knew somebody everywhere you went. Suddenly you lose all those relationships and networking, even down to needing a new doctor or dentist. All of that is tricky.’

Ellman-Brown took comfort in her young students, who were outgoing, enthusiastic and not afraid to ask questions. But even teaching felt foreign at times. ‘The parents were different, much more engaged with their students’ learning and would question things that in Zimbabwe parents would just accept,’ she says. ‘We didn’t have full-time programmes in Zimbabwe so that in itself was a different experience. Even the sense of humour is different so I had to be careful not to say something that might be offensive here.’

Despite the culture shock, language difficulties and teaching discrepancies, all those teachers I spoke with agreed on one thing that ultimately helped them settle in: the RAD family, which knows no cultural or geographic boundaries.

‘I have been really lucky, moving from Iceland to Los Angeles, then the UK, Iceland and now the UK again,’ says Einarsdóttir, who performed with the Isadora Duncan Dance Group before turning to teaching. ‘It’s truly amazing you can move from country to country and yet keep teaching the RAD syllabus.’

Mowen had migrated to Australia in 1974 after Papua New Guinea’s independence resulted in political uncertainty, ultimately settling in Sydney in 1980. She established her own RAD-affiliated dance school but admits to feeling apprehensive.

‘I felt like a very small fish in a very big sea, it was quite different and I was nervous about meeting a worldwide organisation. But when I did the registration and seminars, the RAD teachers I associated with were extremely helpful and I realised RAD in Port Moresby wasn’t that different from RAD in Sydney. I think that’s amazing, that you can move from one country to another and you’re still learning the same work and the same values.’

Allport created her own little RAD family in Acapulco, initially shipping out RAD uniforms until a talented parent learnt how to make them. ‘What I loved is that my students were learning the same RAD work as others around the world. We’d all go on courses together, parents too, we were a very big dance family and I brought students over to the UK for RAD summer schools.’ After 25 years it’s little wonder it took three attempts for Allport to move back to the UK with her children. ‘Mexico definitely became home,’ she says. ‘It took several years for me to stop comparing certain things with the UK but with my family – and the family that were my students and their parents – supporting me I was well and truly accepted,’ she says, noting she received a government award for ‘immigrants providing a rich cultural contribution to Mexico.’

Ellman-Brown is forever thankful for the friendly teachers who took her under their wing and helped her navigate her new life and career. ‘Zimbabwe will always feel like home, it’s where my roots are but I’m very settled in Australia,’ she says. ‘I’ll be honest, it hasn’t been easy, but I have some amazing Australian colleagues who I’ll always be very grateful to for their help and kindness.’

There are a number of support services the RAD offers its members when moving countries, such as access to the international staff based in the RAD’s 36 member countries, advertising job openings and providing resources and information to members through events and connecting them with other members worldwide, from Aruba to the Maldives.

What advice would our teachers give others looking to move internationally? ‘Be aware that things will be different and find a mentor who can guide you through those cultural differences, within a teaching context, and help navigate the teaching fraternity,’ says Ellman-Brown.

Mandy Mackenzie Ng is a visual designer based in London. mandymackenzieng.com

‘It’s hard to believe. You think maybe it’s fireworks or something. But I could see the fire from my window, and deep inside I realised that something impossible had happened.’ 

On her usual morning routine involving a 5am breakfast and fretting over choreography for rehearsals at the National Opera of Ukraine, Zhenya Novikova experienced the unimaginable. ‘I was running over the house thinking maybe I need to go to the basement or maybe I need to pack my stuff,’ she says. ‘I called everyone I knew, my family, friends, to see if they were okay.’ 

In the blink of an eye, Novikova’s world changed drastically: from first soloist at the National Opera to a refugee fleeing Kyiv to find safety. ‘We didn’t know what to do because Russian forces started coming,’ she says, recounting the anxiety she experienced with her husband in their apartment. ‘You don’t know which highway to choose. Is it safe or not? Maybe it’s safer to stay? Maybe it’s safer to go.’

Across our news channels, reports were flying in of thousands of civilians who chose to stay put because they were too scared to leave. Too scared of the unknown awaiting them outside the homes and cities they knew. For Novikova, 38, the choice was made for her and her husband. ‘We heard another explosion very close to our house,’ she says. ‘It was a military plane which fell down. That’s when we decided to go.’ 

About 300 miles south-west of Kiev, Vladyslava Ihnatenko, 19, was working at the Odessa National Academic Theater of Opera and Ballet when the war began; dampening her excitement to perform in the corps de ballet at the opera’s new season. ‘I was staying in Odessa with the family of a friend,’ she says. ‘It was quieter there, so I almost didn’t hear anything when the war started. I didn’t see my parents because all my family were in Kharkiv. I was there alone, and I was very nervous.’

Following the indefinite suspension of performances, many artists and technical workers of the Odessa Opera joined the ranks of fighters to protect the city. With her family miles away and the threat of conflict approaching, Ihnatenko felt isolated and anxious about her future. ‘I saw that there was no job opportunity, and I cannot go back to Kharkiv,’ she says. ‘To stay there alone was hard so that’s why I decided to leave the country.’

She travelled 450 miles all alone to Lviv, which is by the Poland-Ukraine border. The knowledge that a friend was waiting for her in Poland kept her going. For Novikova, the Hungary-Ukraine border felt the better choice, driving for two days without much food or sleep.

In this state, worries about work, family safety, where to sleep next, and settling in a new country are often all refugees think about. Yet in their tired and fragile condition Ihnatenko and Novikova turned to helping others around them. ‘I was trying to help because not all the people there knew English to speak to volunteers,’ Ihnatenko says. In Novikova’s case, it was important for her to feel ‘useful for my country in some tiny way.’ She lived out of her car at the Hungary-Ukraine border for four months, ‘helping people find shelter in different countries and theatres’. 

It’s not so farfetched to see how their profession could be the source of their empathy, giving them something to draw from in crisis. Dance has a beautiful way of bringing people together. ‘I tried to get back to the profession,’ Novikova says, as a way to find herself useful again through the art she loves. Getting people to theatres open to receiving refugees was her way of tying together the power dance gave her with her newfound role at the border. 

Creating this environment of safety, consistency, and fun is an ethos that runs through RAD and its teachers. In her work supporting refugee and asylum-seeking children through ballet in Wales, Shelley Isaac-Clarke realised that ‘in dancing together they not only found ways to have lots of fun, but also to become more self-aware and gain confidence in self-communication.’ 

‘Dance can be a wonderful way of bringing people together,’ she adds. ‘If we can in any way use the medium of dance to support displaced people, to break down barriers, bring local communities together, be more inclusive, at a time when the world continues to feel so uncertain, we will all reap the benefits of the shared experience.’

Yet it must be so hard to focus on dance, to get lost in the emotion and joy of it after the pain of displacement and war. ‘Of course, it was hard to focus on dancing,’ Ihnatenko says. ‘I guess the main thing is just to be safe from the bad things. But you can just take all of your power, even anger and just put it in dance. It makes it easier.’

With the support of friends touring to Norway, Novikova made her way across Europe to find a ‘place to dance and get back in shape. It gave me a healing feeling because I felt new again.’ From there, news spread of the United Ukrainian Ballet at the Hague in the Netherlands. 

The company was founded to train and employ Ukrainian dancers, creatives, and technicians who fled their country. ‘There were a lot of Ukrainians going so I wanted to join my people,’ Novikova says. ‘I heard that Alexei Ratmansky was going to make work and he’s a legend. So, I applied to be a member of this company and I was accepted.’

Ihnatenko also found her way to the company, reuniting with friends she had lost when she fled. ‘I’m good here because it’s like a community,’ she says. ‘We’re trying to support each other, as we understand each other the most in this case. I was afraid of not being able to dance again but it’s easier now. Having people around you [to focus on dancing again] is helping.’

With a tour of Ratmansky’s production of Giselle – the renowned choreographer spent his childhood in Kyiv and has been outspoken about the Russian invasion – in the Netherlands and London, Novikova and Ihnatenko have finally been on stage again. Kira will also take to the stage at a local Hersham theatre. But despite the new lives being built, there’s still much anxiety about what their future holds. 

‘I guess I’m moving in the right direction,’ Ihnatenko says. For Novikova, it’s one step at a time. ‘I felt unsafe for months after I left the Ukraine,’ she says. ‘I was jumping when a door shut or loud sounds, but here my nervous system is getting stabilised. It’s easier because of dance.’ 

Kira’s mother Iryna is determined to return to the Ukraine despite her anxiety. But Kira’s voice belting ‘I love dancing!’ melts this tension away. For now, this innocent joy of dance is all that matters.

Isaac Ouro-Gnao is a Togolese-British multidisciplinary artist and freelance journalist.

Ksenia Anisimova and her family are making a special stop during their trip to Seoul, the megacity capital of South Korea. The mother of two from New York City, along with her mother and children, visits a dance studio located in a basement of the hip, youthful neighbourhood of Hapjeong-dong. Inside the bright-lit room with its mirrored walls, the family stare back at reflections that reveal a mix of excitement and awkwardness. The seven-year-old son even blushes as he tries to shake off his embarrassment. 

The dance instructor blasts on BTS’ Permission to Dance. One step at a time, the family learns routines made famous by the boy band who usually show off their famed ‘knife-like precision dance moves’ in packed stadiums. The unique attraction of this class is that Jeong Soo-min, leading the 90-minute tutorial, has danced beside BTS and other K-pop giants like Blackpink and GOT7 many times before. She’s also a dance trainer at a major entertainment label. 

At the American Music Awards in 2021, BTS became the first Asian act to be named artist of the year: a sign that K-pop (Korean popular music) has conquered the world. BTS is also the most streamed group on Spotify and the most followed on Instagram; in 2021 entertainment businesses listed in Seoul earned a record $3.8bn. Popular at home since the 1990s, social media has helped K-pop spread internationally. The music journalist Maria Sherman describes it as ‘a maximalist dreamland full of colour, high concept-performances and videos, a plethora of performers and unrivalled choreography.’

As the name implies, visitors to Real K-pop Dance get to feel like a star. They learn from backing dancers who usually perform alongside favourite groups. In the break, the family chats in Russian. But during the class, language doesn’t pose a problem. Jeong teaches each move with a simple ‘1,2,3,4’ while the students attempt to mirror her. 

‘I saw some videos of K-pop groups on YouTube, and I thought it was the most fascinating thing,’ says Anisimova. ‘I had to check it out more.’ She was especially intrigued by the incorporation of sign language in the video for Permission to Dance; back home, she works with students who are deaf or have learning disabilities. 

‘When our teacher first showed us what we needed to learn today, we thought we couldn’t possibly do it,’ she says. ‘But we’re able to do most of the general moves now. I would say this is one of the best stops on our tour.’

It’s exactly this tourist appeal that gave Kim Min-sung the idea for his business in 2015, after a career as a backing dancer for K-pop legends like first generation boy band H.O.T. ‘When I was a student majoring in tourism, I remember a news article that highlighted how Chinese tourists were coming to South Korea,’ he recalls. ‘When I looked up their typical itinerary, there wasn’t anything new or exciting.’

He set up shop in Hongdae, a magnet for foreign travellers, lined with glitzy restaurants, bars and shops. ‘Most of our clients are young women in their teens or twenties, but we also have men and even parents coming with their children. A lot come from surrounding regions like China, Japan and southeast Asian countries while many still come from the Americas.’ 

‘As the stars’ skills keep rising, every label has higher expectations of the students’

– Kim Ji-sun

Today, K-pop is a powerhouse genre with audiences in almost every corner of the world. But this was not the case when Lee made up routines in his room in the late 1990s, as first-generation groups like H.O.T. and S.E.S. introduced the evolving South Korean music scene to a wider public. ‘I was so addicted to H.O.T. that I would constantly watch clips of them at breakfast and as soon as I got home from school,’ Kim says. ‘But I never thought that our country’s music would become a global force in content and culture as it is now.’

The 16-year-old Kim was amazed at how each of H.O.T.’s albums would introduce a whole new visual concept and vibe. The group’s hairstyles featured mint colours, samurai styles, ponytails and dreadlocks. Their costumes were even more out-of-this-world: Edward Scissorhands looks would be followed a few months later by outfits resembling the Teletubbies – cute accessories and all. 

‘It’s star quality that separates K-pop from the rest of the field,’ Kim says. ‘Not only do they possess world class vocals and dancing abilities, their visuals are flawless and their styles are among the best in the world.’ On social media platforms like YouTube and TikTok, dance challenges uploaded by K-pop groups rack up millions of views. ‘The dancing style is mixed with hip-hop, popping, house and more,’ Kim says. ‘K-pop doesn’t cling to tradition. It is well-suited to changing styles and adapting to the latest trends in pop culture.’

The road to glory is only for the very few. Young people hoping to forge a career in K-pop face a difficult path. They typically enter an entertainment company in their teens, honing their skills in singing, rapping, dancing and foreign languages. If they have enough talent and luck, they may be selected to join a group.

One Thursday dinner time, students pack into LP Dance, a multi-story building in the bustling Gangnam district (yes, it’s what the song Gangnam Style was about). Most are girls in their mid teens with long black hair, in baggy sweatpants and sneakers. The chatter in the hallways doesn’t stop for an instant as classmates discuss how they’ve prepared for their monthly evaluation.

As soon as the doors open, about 20 girls flock into a wide, mirrored studio. The music kicks in and the atmosphere changes instantly: no more laughing or smiling. Girls who looked fragile make the floor rumble with fast, synchronised steps and precision routines. Tiny details like waving fingers before they turn or calculated gazes in the mirror give them the aura of a K-pop girl group. There’s an air of seriousness and competition as the academy’s director enters and surveys the dancers. 

In the audition class, where 150 students vie for a place with the entertainment labels that churn out superstars, students are graded on dance and overall appearance, including both facial expressions plus something less tangible. ‘There’s skill, but we also highly regard an entertainer’s star power,’ Kim Ji-sun, director of LP Dance, explains. ‘I look at it as likability, or the ability to make people come back for more. In addition to a great personality, they must be able to incorporate their strengths into their dance so they can make a significant imprint on the eye.’ 

Each month, top performers win the chance to be filmed for audition clips sent to the entertainment agencies. There are also anything between four to 10 open auditions at the academy where scouts from major labels will critique the dancers. ‘As the stars’ skills in dance, singing and other talents like acting keep rising,’ says Kim Ji-sun, ‘every label has higher expectations of students training at academies.’

Despite this external pressure, it’s the students themselves who push the boundaries of training. South Korea has one of the world’s best-educated labour forces and it’s customary for students to attend after-school crammers and study into the night. On top of rigorous school work, students at LP Dance spend up to five hours in the studio on weekdays and some even come in at weekends. The studios are open seven days a week to accommodate students who come as far from Daegu and Gangneung – each a six-hour round trip from Seoul. 

For 16-year-old Lee Seul, the fear that she’s almost too old to become a trainee with an entertainment label drives her to practise even when  tired. Kim Suh-jung, also 16, always arrives two hours before class to do strength exercises. After class, he spends another two to three hours honing his dance routines and expressions. 

‘K-pop dance gives you euphoria when you hit every beat on cue,’ he says. ‘You can’t help but smile when you’re dancing to some of these songs. As I want to become someone who feels this happiness on stage, practice can’t be taken out of the equation for the sake of my future.’ 

Even younger students show similar determination. Rahel, 8, is the youngest of the audition group and has assured her mother and the academy that she wants to dance with the big girls instead of students her own age. ‘She found the academy online by herself, telling me that it had the longest tradition, going back 20 years, and was known to host a lot of open auditions,’ says her mother, Lee Seok-hee.

To build her confidence, Rahel takes every chance to dance, and her role model is Jang Won-young of the girl group IVE. ‘As today is the monthly evaluation, we looked at clips of Jang,’ says Lee. ‘Even as we left the house, Rahel kept practising facial expressions in front of the mirror.’ Rahel takes a deep breath, does a final stretch and enters the room to pursue her K-pop dreams.

David D Lee is a freelance reporter based in Seoul, writing for South China Morning Post, Vice Asia and others.

Jun Michael Park is a documentary photographer and filmmaker from Seoul. He contributes to the New York Times and Monocle.