Dance Info Finland is charged with promoting the development of Finnish dance art and improving its status and operating conditions in society. In the course of this work it acts as a broad-based expert organisation whose activities include
Dance Info Finland’s aims are furthered by means of both domestic and internationally oriented work.
Service and advisory work
The main domestic target groups for Dance Info's service activities are dance-field professionals, decision-makers and other actors in the sphere of culture politics, and the mass media. It also serves enthusiasts in the field and the wider audience who are interested in dance.
Service activities are offered partly through personal meetings and via the telephone and e-mail, but most service work is executed through web pages and electronic newsletters.
The main services on the Finnish web site are a performance calendar, different kinds of link lists, and the What’s New section and its three sub-sections (two in English): News, Bulletin Board, and Dance Info Now. Dance Info Finland also disseminates information through its newsletters, both domestically and internationally.
Publications and promotion
Until the end of 2011 Dance Info Finland published the Finnish-language Tanssi magazine, which came out five times a year. Apart from Finnish dance art, the magazine covered international dance phenomena and members of the field, especially those who are influential with regards to Finnish dance art.
Dance Info Finland publishes the English-language Finnish Dance in Focus magazine once a year. It also annually produces other promotional material about Finnish dance art. Some Finnish dance promotional work is also executed through an expert guest programme.
Research and development work
Dance Info Finland strives to increase information and research regarding activities in the dance field, both through its own endeavours and by promoting other research, reporting and development projects. Its core activities are collecting, analysing and publishing statistical information on its web site, and the maintenance and development of the Tanka database.
Audience work
Dance Info Finland’s audience work is mainly executed through its web pages, particularly the Can creeping be dance? guide to watching dance art that was launched in autumn 2007. The other main part of its audience work is International Dance Day.
It encourages different actors in the dance field to celebrate the day and coordinates the dissemination of information about all the various events that are held on the day and over the preceding week. International Dance Day is celebrated on 29 April.
Education
Dance Info Finland's own educational work concentrates on training small groups, in which pedagogical targets and the teacher’s professional skills and expertise can be best addressed. Education is offered according to available resources.
Networks
Dance Info Finland is a member of the following international organisations: IETM - International Network for Contemporary Performing Arts, ENICPA - The European Network for Information Centres of the Performing Arts, and NOFOD – Nordic Forum for Dance Research.
It is also an active member of the North European Dance Meeting network, whose goal is to promote cooperation in the Nordic and Baltic countries between dance artists and other members of the field.
In Finland, Dance Info Finland is part of Art Networks, which covers different artistic information centres and export organisations. It also participates in cultural export support network activities. The cultural export support network is a Ministry of Education initiative which was created as an information channel for the promotion of cultural exports.
Advocacy
Dance Info Finland's tasks and activities, along with its role as an expert organisation, are crystallised in the work it does to make a political impact. Improving the status and operational conditions of dance art requires service and advice work, the dissemination of information, the production and promotion of publications, audience work, education and the production of basic information about activities in the field.
Dance Info Finland actively strives to increase the level of public support for dance and cooperates with other organisations in the dance field in taking a stand on culture politics issues that relate to dance art.
Organisation and administration
Dance Info Finland has eleven member organisations which represent different dance genres, from contemporary and ballet to folk and ballroom dancing. Its governing body is comprised of eight people and a chairperson, who are chosen at the annual general meeting. Members sit for a two-year term, and half are replaced at each AGM.
Dance Info Finland's permanent staff is comprised of an executive director, a head of international affairs, the chief editor of the Tanssi and Finnish Dance in Focus magazines, and two communications officers, who are in practice responsible for many other things besides. Between one and three project workers are also hired annually. Dance Info Finland runs on State funding, project-specific grants and self-generated income.