AttitudeLive - Dancing On Wheels

After being paralysed for 18 years, Rodney Bell is now in tune with his body more than ever, and making a living as a professional dancer in America.

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♪[singing]♪

Coming back home was a big eye opener,

you know everything is so colourful,

the air is sweeter.

And then you go away and you learn,

about other cultures and you

actually learn lots more about your own.

Rodney Bell is making a brief visit home

from the USA where he's built a career

as a dancer.

With these wheels around spinergy wheels,

bit easier for me to swing around you know.

So could do like a pitstop...

Rodney's talent caught the eye of Axis,

a cutting edge dance company based

in San Francisco.

San Francisco - timing wise - I had access

right then at their twentieth year anniversary

they'd just, like, gone through all these

different dancers and they were needing

something to just, to burn the fire a bit

bigger for them.

Physically, our sort of body's more limber, you know.

I've danced with different styles of dance

that have brought on different like,

technique and different ways of moving.

And I really, I really appreciate my body now

to tell you the truth.

I definitely think it's very important -

to warm up my legs - I'm just doing

light bounces onto my ankles..

Physiotherapists would probably like,

kick my butt, but for me, I found this works,

it sort of relaxes my ankles. I'm not like,

hard out jarring them down,

just lightly trying to connect with

my lower half.

It's nice to be connecting to the

surface you're going to be dancing,

with or on you know.

Disability combined with Maoridom

gives Rodney a unique edge.

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I come from a strong bloodline

Ngāti Maniapoto, and like,

it was first and foremost in my family,

it's in the blood, so there's a lot

of traditions around how the culture

dealt with things.

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My dance is really earthy and goes

back to the elements you know, like

the earth, and the air, fire

and water and stuff so I'm in that moment.

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This chair at the end of the day,

me and this chair's doing this duet

in the space - I'm basically manoeuvring it

and holding it's pose or structure,

but then again, this thing's carrying

me and supporting me

through my movements as well.

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I feel that I am disabled,

I can't hide that, so going out there

and trying to do this contemporary dance

and trying to say that I'm this cutting edge

contemporary dancer, I have to have

the label "disabled" under

because that's what I am.

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