Excitement is building as we approach UNANIMOUS, our annual youth dance platform, which takes place at The MAC on 17th April.
One of this year’s participating groups, FYI Dance Club from Wicklow, has been a regular at UNANIMOUS for over five years. In a short interview, their founder, Zoe Patterson, shares how experiences like this inspire young dancers, build confidence, and create lasting connections.
Zoe started dancing as a child alternating between ballet and modern before starting at dance college aged 15 which involved a daily commute to Dublin which started at 7am and finished at 7pm.
After finishing her Leaving Cert and a year studying in Liverpool, Zoe realised she was enjoying teaching dance more than professional performance. It took some time and personal conviction to come to terms with not pursing a career as a professional dancer and managing feelings of failure. However Zoe became increasingly convinced of the importance of teaching, and after delivering hip-hop classes in primary schools, where she was able create safe and enjoyable place to dance for all children, she decided to embark on a BA in Dance Education.
Zoe founded FYI Dance Club in 2003 and the company includes students from street dance and modern theatre classes, ranging in age from 11 to 18 years old. Being teacher and owner, the business has been able to change shape and focus as her son, Oliver – now 11, has grown up alongside. Oliver now dances in the school and helps his mum with set-up and preparation. It has become a real family affair!
Zoe and Oliver at SHIFT, August 2024
FYI Dance Club has always brought together young people from different schools and different backgrounds and undergone significant growth and development. But last year, Zoe, by her own definition, was experiencing burnout and increasingly felt she had become a ‘”Dance Doubter”; unsure if dance was making a difference to people’s lives. Ultimately she didn’t feel her classes resonated with young people and so she questioned if she was still relevant. Zoe decided that the club’s involvement in SHIFT, DU Dance (NI)’s youth dance and music residential and performances focused on the climate crisis last August, would dictate the future direction she took.
Fortunately for Wicklow’s young dancers, the week in Belfast meeting, creating and performing with other dance groups and working with Southpaw Dance Company was to be an incredibly positive experience for Zoe and one which emboldened her to set off on a new trajectory. Now Zoe is more determined than ever to challenge the perceptions perpetuated by social media and television that dance isn’t accessible. She firmly believes that there is a level and place for everyone to get involved and recently started a wheelchair dance group.
Fast forward 6 months and FYI Dance Club will again, as they have for over the past five years, be joining DU Dance (NI) at their annual youth dance platform UNANIMOUS in The MAC on 17th April 2025.
For Zoe, coming to Belfast for Unanimous was the first time she found a like-minded community in Ireland focused on giving young people a voice, a stage, a space to share and collaborate. The simple act, sanctioned by Mags Byrne, Artistic Director of Unanimous, of encouraging the young people to watch the other groups’ rehearsals and performances – rather than waiting backstage – expands their ambitions and ignites creative sparks. Furthermore the experience of working with a tech team, designing costumes, and importantly telling a story all means the Unanimous experience is layered and rich. When Zoe first brought a group to Unanimous they simply presented three hip hop performances. Now the pieces have evolved; exploring more challenging choreography and taking on more complex themes and ideas.
Inspired by a song, Zoe worked up the concept for his year’s piece Disrupt and Rise but is quick to make clear that it is 98% choreographed by the young people. “They have considered what story they want to tell and the resulting work provides a profound and candid examination of the world and how individuals react to the achievements of others. During an ascent, you receive encouragement and support. However, once at the top, it often feels like everyone is trying to pull you back down. Although the song addresses this issue specifically for women, the young people has explored how it can resonate with everyone,” explained Zoe. One can’t help wondering just how influential Zoe, and her journey to this point, have been on the young people who join her classes. The work in progress was shared at last September’s Culture Night in Wicklow to great acclaim and interest and will no doubt delight audiences in Belfast.
The Unanimous experience starts the moment the group leave Wicklow at 7am. The bonding and banter on the bus, the sense of being part of a tribe, of not having to put on a façade, all adds to the experience. Zoe is clear with the young people that they are needed, respected but also responsible and carrying high expectations. As a result they rise to the challenge with a sense of pride. Unanimous is a hugely important date in the diary for the dancers. For Zoe, Unanimous, a youth dance festival with youth at the centre, has been the catalyst for ever expanding contacts and networks across the Irish Youth Dance Culture sector, for a busy diary of festivals and events, for performance and collaboration opportunities and for the confidence with which she is taking FYI Dance Club forward.
(Article originally published by Theatre and Dance NI on 1 April 2025.)
Tickets for Unanimous are available to purchase from The MAC: 028 9023 5053 / themaclive.com. Tickets are priced at £10 for adults / £6 for Under 16s and concessions.
Contact tickets@themaclive.com for information about group rates.
