Press

L’OBS, a prominent French news magazine, features Dance Can Do’s work at Necker Hospital, Paris, with Paris Opera dancers.

Close to the Stars: When Dance Gives Wings to Vulnerable Children
By L’Obs with AFP

In a resuscitation room where the beeping of a monitor can be heard, an unusual scene unfolds: a boy on a ventilator watches intently as two stars of the Paris Opera Ballet, dressed in shimmering costumes, perform dance steps in front of him.

“We’re going to take a little walk, do an arabesque, and hop, a fish lift,” explains dancer Hugo Marchand as he performs the moves with his partner Dorothée Gilbert. “We just came to say a quick hello and send you a kiss.” The child responds with a small wave.

In another room at Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital in Paris, a baby watches wide-eyed as Dorothée Gilbert’s costume twirls with a pirouette.

Behind this initiative is a Swiss-French association called “The What Dance Can Do Project”, which since its founding in 2018 has worked to bring dance into the lives of children—especially those facing poverty, exile, or illness.

A Touch of Lightness
The project’s reach continues to grow, from an orphanage in Morocco to a dance school in Wellington, New Zealand, and hospitals in Zurich and Paris. At Necker, dancers from the Paris Opera, now “ambassadors” of the association, bring a ray of sunshine to children suffering from life-threatening conditions.

“Suddenly, you see it lifts them out of their difficult daily lives. What moves me most is being able to bring a bit of lightness,” Hugo Marchand tells AFP. “I always hope these children fall asleep at night dreaming of dance.”

“In their eyes, you see sparks—curiosity, admiration maybe, or just ‘what on earth are these two doing?’” laughs Dorothée Gilbert, who wants to help the children forget, even for a minute, that they’re in a hospital and take them on a journey.

From her bed, 15-year-old Maély smiles as she watches Hugo Marchand leap down the hallway. “We’re like big frogs,” he jokes.

“There’s no language in ballet?” she asks. The dancers then demonstrate pantomime. “I’m the Swan Queen,” says Dorothée Gilbert, placing her right hand above her head to represent a crown.

Room by room, the stars—slightly emotional—dressed in green and gold costumes from the grand ballet La Bayadère and wearing surgical masks, joke with healthcare workers and explain their profession. “It’s like Jasmine and Aladdin. And in the second act, I get married and arrive on a giant elephant—can you imagine?” Hugo says to an amused little boy.

Sometimes, the children surprise the dancers. “Do you dance Frozen?” asks 16-year-old Patricia as they list classic ballets.

“We see the positive effect on some patients after visits from outside performers; we see them smile when they hadn’t been smiling,” says Fabrice Lesage, head of the ICU. “It gives them energy to get better.”

“United Nations of Dance”
For the dancers, the experience brings a sense of being “useful” to society, explains Hugo, who once invited young refugees to the Palais Garnier for a dance class with fellow “ambassador” étoile Léonore Baulac.

Aurélia Sellier, the project’s founder, was inspired during a trip to a South African township by dancer and choreographer Theo Ndindwa, who advocates for dance as a tool for social change.

With around thirty volunteers and crowdfunding, the association collaborates with local dance teachers—in places like Tunis and Kibera (Kenya)—where children, “very aware of being excluded from society, assert themselves through dance,” especially classical ballet, says Sellier.

The initiatives go beyond ballet, including contemporary dance, hip-hop, and choreography—like a pre-COVID project with young refugees in Paris.

“Our goal in five or ten years is to have an international federation with local associations… a kind of United Nations of Dance,” smiles Sellier.