I first saw British choreographer Ben Duke’s Paradise Lost (Lies Unopened Beside Me) at the Edinburgh Festival in 2015. A witty yet poignant reimagining of Milton’s epic poem, it blended dance with theatre and peppered literary allusions with anecdotal humor, leaving my young mind exhilarated and challenged. There was one moment, however, that didn’t quite resonate. ‘We wanted to change the world… through contemporary dance,’ said Duke when reminiscing about a youthful romantic relationship, prompting knowing chuckles from audience members. I, a 19-year-old dance student, didn’t find it funny. Of course dance could change the world. Of course I could, as popular meme account Somatic Based Content Only once put it on Instagram, lift my leg to 90 degrees… push forward with my pelvis and abolish the police.

Over the past decade, I’ve grown more cynical. Hardened by heartbreak, redundancy, and the relentless onslaught of global turmoil, I sometimes find myself questioning the tangible impact dance can have amidst the chaos. So when Solène Weinachter – who has performed extensively with Duke – presented her solo AFTER ALL at Spring Forward 2025, I couldn’t help but relate to her self-deprecating reflections on how her MA in contemporary dance had somehow prepared her (or not?) for the dark absurdity of her uncle’s funeral. Judging by the audience’s bursts of laughter as she demi-plié’d and mimed a butterfly floating to heaven to Frank Sinatra’s My Way in her eulogic solo, I wasn’t alone.

As 00’s UK indie rock band The Libertines sing in their track The Good Old Days, ‘if you’ve lost your faith in love and music, the end won’t be long.’ Over the past six months, I’ve found myself dancing close to the edge of that faith. Yet, several works at Spring Forward drew me back, reminding me of dance’s unique ability to foster connection, hope, and reflection. Some performances, like Weinachter’s exploration of mortality and Irish company Junk Ensemble’s duet on aging, demonstrated how dance can create a safe, communal space for processing difficult aspects of the human experience. Others, like Aristide Rontini’s Lampyris Noctiluca, illustrated its power in helping marginalised groups reclaim agency. In it, the disabled Italian choreographer asserts his body as sensual and seductive – qualities society often denies to those with disabilities – through rippling movements and self-caresses.

Dance can also act as a form of resistance. Lebanese choreographer Charlie Khalil Prince’s the body symphonic was a prime example of this. Created in response to the ongoing crises in his home country, the solo builds to a defiant crescendo. Prince rhythmically stamps his feet – at times evoking the syncopated patterns of dabke, a Levantine folk dance associated with resistance – flourishes his hands in intricate gestures, and sweeps across the stage in ever-shifting pathways. Sharp ‘huh’s punctuate the air, part exhalation, part exorcism.

Prince is quick to acknowledge the limits of the work. In a panel discussion I moderated with him, Rontini, and Junk Ensemble performer Finola Cronin on the theme of ‘borderlessness’ at Spring Forward, he spoke about the tension he felt creating his solo in Europe – a region defined by relative freedom of movement – while reflecting on a territory marked by restriction and displacement. the body symphonic, like any dance work, may not directly resolve these issues, yet it offers a somatic blueprint for navigating them. By the end of the solo, Prince moves with a boundless energy, as though he has found a physical, if not political, liberation. It suggests that while dance might not immediately transform the fractured world we inhabit, it can help us to imagine new ones – in the theatre, and within our own bodies. These imagined spaces can offer respite and renewal, allowing us to move forward with vigour and resolve.

At Spring Forward, new worlds aren’t just imagined on stage. Springback Academy – the festival’s accompanying criticism programme, or as I’ve joked for years, a kind of dance writing cult – feels like a newly envisioned society in itself. Over three days, ten writers and four mentors watch over 20 performances, gathering in scattered moments to write, reflect, and edit. This intense yet communal rhythm creates a temporary ecosystem where language becomes a way of making sense not just of movement, but of big ideas, from grief to joy, politics to identity.

Eventually, we all have to leave these new worlds – returning to a reality that often feels a little less generous. The hope is, I guess, that just as outlandish fashion trends trickle down from runway to clothing stores, the utopian visions glimpsed at festivals like Spring Forward eventually ripple into the wider world, slowly reshaping how we relate, create, and move through it.

In AFTER ALL, Weinachter urged herself to ‘use what you know’ to confront one of life’s most difficult moments. That has stuck with me. Sure, legal lobbying, protest, and policy reform may drive structural change in a more quantifiable way than expertly performed contractions, hip thrusts, or leg extensions. But for me, and many others at Spring Forward, what we know is dance. There’s no use in lamenting the limits of our chosen sector – or denying its power, especially when government cuts to the arts and targeted censorship demonstrate that its impact is very much recognised. Instead, our task is to use our knowledge with imagination: to change, invent, and nurture a new world in the best way we can. As Aerowaves partner Rui Torrinha – host of next year’s Spring Forward in Portugal – reminded us at the closing ceremony, quoting Alice Walker: ‘Hard times require furious dancing.’