photo: Dana Salisbury; used with permissionWith few exceptions (music, sculpture, tactile canvases), the Arts have typically been inaccessible to people who are blind or who have visual difficulties, but the times, as is often said, are a-changing. Dana Salisbury and the No-See-Ums will be presenting BARK! An Unseen Dance, at four New York Public Libraries this month. Based on non-visual perception, this is the first dance form fully accessible to people who are blind or visually impaired.

Choreographed by Dana Salisbury in collaboration with the dancers, BARK! is performed for blindfolded and visually impaired audiences. Dancers reveal themselves and the space through the other senses: sound, scent, touch, temperature, and the movement of air. The audience members are placed within the action and occasionally moved, which shifts their relationship to the environment, the performers, and to one another.

The dancers include Amy Baumgarten, CJ Holm, Mari Meade Montoya, EmmaGrace Skove-Epes, as well as Dana Salisbury, and guests Ashley Handel, Breanna Gribble, and Ashni Sunder. The actual casts will vary for each date.

The performances will be held at 2:00 p.m. on Saturdays in March at the following libraries. For Adults Only. Registration is required.

• March 5 - Richmondtown Library
• March 12 - Andrew Heiskell Library
• March 19 - Webster Library
• March 26 - 115th Street Library

Read more in the Staten Island Advance: "Dancing in the Dark on Staten Island."

Unseen Dance is made possible in part with public funds from the Fund for Creative Communities, supported by the New York State Council on the Arts and administered by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and by contributions made by supporters of the Andrew Heiskell Braille and Talking Book Library.