The Nation’s favourite dish has become an unexpected subject of choreography at the Royal Academy of Dance in London. Thanks to Isle of Man Arts Council student Lily McKinnon, who is studying for a BA (Hons) in Ballet Education, the rare and much loved dish became the focus for Lily to choreograph fellow students for one of her modules. Below Lily explains how this meeting of dance and food came about.

“One of our modules for our second semester was a choreography module where we have to choreograph a trio.  This year the stimulus was “recipe” and since chips cheese and gravy has three ingredients and there was three dancers I thought it would be perfect!

It was a very fun process and I used the Manx Triskelion as a motif that featured throughout my choreography. Each dancer represents an ingredient and I looked at the relationships between the different ingredients through dance. As a result of feedback and communication I developed my piece to better portray the theme since I didn’t realise how much of a foreign concept chips cheese and gravy is in England. Therefore, I added in the chip boxes and national anthem at the start of the piece to set the scene. The music used is “Ayrn Nane” by Lochtán which really gave it a Manx feel.

In the assessment following my dancers portraying my vision brilliantly, really bringing the ingredients to life, there was a subsequent discussion where I got to elaborate on my choreographic processes and share a bit about the Isle of Man. I think my tutor also found it quite interesting and informative! I never thought I would be choreographing a dance about chips cheese and gravy as part of my degree but it was so lovely to share a piece of home with everyone at RAD.”