Title: Improvisation as Disability Culture
Facilitator: Choreographer, Educator & Cultural Worker Kayla Hamilton
Date: May 28, 2026 (Thursday), 5 pm -7:30 pm
Location: Un-Label Studio
Language: English Spoken Language
About
In this one-day dance workshop, we explore dance improvisation through the lens of lived disability experience.
Accessibility is the starting point of all artistic work here. The workshop is led by Kayla Hamilton, a performance artist, dancer, and educator from the Bronx, whose work centers the lives, stories, and works of Black disabled people. Drawing from an intersectional perspective, the workshop asks how racism, ableism, and other power structures inscribe themselves in the body and in artistic practices. And examines how improvisation can be a space in which these experiences are made visible and transformed.
We move away from fixed ideas about what art should be and how it should look. Each session includes guided, open-ended prompts that can be engaged from a range of positions – sitting, standing, lying down, moving, or observing – allowing participants to choose the pace and level of involvement that feels right for their bodies.
We will use a mix of verbal, visual, tactile, and imaginative cues to support different ways of participating, while building in space for rest, pause, and reflection. Together, we will practice listening, adapting, and responding to ourselves and each other, understanding improvisation as a shared process of attention and relationship.
Technique is redefined – not as sameness or replication, but as presence, connection, and responsiveness in the moment.
This workshop is open to disabled people without prior experience who want to be creative, try something new, and have their first experiences with dance in an open and welcoming atmosphere. At the heart of it is the joy of movement, experimentation, and shared discovery.
Speaker
Kayla Hamilton
Kayla Hamilton is a choreographer, educator, and cultural worker working at the intersections of disability and blackness. Her work has been presented at The Shed, Gibney, Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance, and New York Live Arts, and she has performed with Kinetic Light, Sydnie L. Mosley, Paloma McGregor, and Gesel Mason. An United States Artist Disability Futures Fellow and Bessie Award recipient, Kayla leads as co-director of Angela’s Pulse Dancing While Black and as co-facilitator of How We Move, a summer intensive for disabled artists. She also directs the Access.Movement.Play Residency at Movement Research, cultivating new ways of creating through disabled embodiment. A former public school special education teacher, Kayla brings care and rigor into her work as a consultant with institutions including the Mellon Foundation and New York Live Arts. Her practice spans choreography, dramaturgy, and writing verbal descriptions, pushing dance to be expansive, accessible, and just. Kayla is a fellow of the Pina Bausch Fellowship for Dance and Choreography.
Access
All event spaces are wheelchair accessible. Assistance dogs are welcome.
- Accessible for wheelchair users, ground-level access (door width entrance door 85 cm, door width glass door to studio 105 cm)
- Barrier-free bathroom with shower and toilet, including a lift system for wheelchair users (door with 82 cm)
- Barrier-free access to the garden via a stairlift for wheelchair users (door width studio to storage room where the lift is located 77 cm, door width storage room to garden 100 cm)
- Automatic door opener at entrance door
- 3 designated disabled parking spaces directly in front of the venue
- 1 additional disabled parking space provided by the City of Cologne around the corner
- Public transport: The barrier-free “Lenauplatz” stop of the tram line 5 is 100 meters away
If needed, we can provide the following support services. Please indicate your requirements when registering:
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- Peer to peer translation from English to German language
More Information
Address: Un-Label Studio | Hosterstr. 1-5 | 50825 Cologne-Neuehrenfeld
The Lenauplatz stop (barrier-free) of KVB Line 5 (Dom / Hbf – Ossendorf) is located in close proximity to the building at Hosterstraße 1-5.
Departure times (KVB)
For questions and further information, contact us at:
nikos@un-label.eu
+49 (221) – 5501544
info@un-label.eu
Photos: © Travis Magee
The WORKSHOP:dance is part of the project Inklusive KUNSTLABORE
