Award spotlight shines on dance company director

October 30, 2014

Award spotlight shines on dance company director

Lyn Cotton, director of integrated dance company Jolt, is being recognised for giving people with disabilities a voice through performance.

The Christchurch woman is a finalist in the Making a Difference category in the 2014 Attitude Awards. The national awards celebrate the excellence and achievements of Kiwis with a disability.

Originally trained as a drama teacher, Lyn was introduced to the world of integrated dance in 1995 while teaching in London. She was inspired by renowned choreographer and artistic director Wolfgang Strange and performed with his company Amici across Europe.

“I watched Wolfgang create a dance with a severely physically and intellectually disabled student,” Lyn says. “The dance moved me because it never sought to impose a structure on the student, but instead allowed him to express his own creativity.”

Fuelled with a passion for dance, Lyn returned to New Zealand in 2001 and brought her vision of a local integrated dance class to fruition. What began as one class soon blossomed into Jolt Dance. Today Jolt has eight classes for all ages and abilities and three performance companies have grown from the classes: Jolt Dance Company established in 2002, Jolt Youth in 2007 and Jolt Interactive in 2012, funded by Creative NZ.

Most recently, Lyn’s passion has been directed into establishing Move, New Zealand’s first integrated dance tutor training scheme, in which Jolt Dancers are trained as teachers. Two of Move’s trainees are about to start running their own classes. Lyn says it’s a joy to see participants who have been performing with Jolt for years share their skills with others.

As well as dedicating her time to running Jolt, Lyn contributes many hours to other arts initiatives, including supporting mainstream artists and teachers to be more inclusive, ensuring fair pay and conditions for dancers and contributing to arts policy.

Lyn is humbled by her Attitude Award nomination, saying: “I do this because I love it, it uses all my skills and I get to be the best person I can be. I am moved by what my dancers can do and I want others to see that.”

She will find out if she has won the Making a Difference award at a black-tie gala on World Disability Day, December 3 at Auckland’s Viaduct Events Centre.

There are eight categories in the 2014 Attitude Awards: Sport Performer of the Year, Courage in Sport, Artistic Achievement, Youth, Spirit of Attitude, the Attitude ACC Employer Award, Making a Difference Award and the inaugural Attitude Junior Award. The overall winner of the Attitude ACC Supreme Award is selected from the category winners and a People’s Choice winner and a Hall of Fame inductee are also announced on the night.

Attitude Awards Trustee Dan Buckingham, a member of the elite national wheelchair rugby team the Wheel Blacks, says: “This is such an exciting time for everyone at Attitude Pictures because we find out who the finalists are. We have started travelling the country to film the finalists and even though this is the seventh year their stories continue to amaze us.”

Dan encourages everyone to visit AttitudeLive.com, an innovative web platform created by Attitude Pictures, in early November to see the short films of the finalists and to vote for the person most deserving of the coveted ‘People’s Choice Award.’

The Making a Difference award is sponsored by the Ministry of Health. Other sponsors supporting the awards include: Drake Medox, Invacare, Barfoot & Thompson, IHC Foundation, Westpac, Air New Zealand and Wayne Francis Charitable Trust.

Chief Executive of ACC Scott Pickering says ACC is proud to be principal sponsor of the awards for the seventh year, including sponsorship of the Attitude ACC Employer Award and the Attitude ACC Supreme Award.

"I'm really looking forward to this year's Attitude Awards, which are a significant event on New Zealand's calendar. Through celebrating excellence in the disability community and the important contributions made by New Zealanders with disabilities, the awards have the power to shift perceptions and to enhance lives."

For tickets to the Attitude Awards gala evening on Dec 3 contact Sue Wales-Earl at sue@attitudeawards.org

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Watch previous awards footage at www.attitudelive.com

ENDS

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