CLEVELAND — One group in northeast Ohio is changing the way we think of dance by setting the stage for increased inclusivity in the arts. 

What You Need To Know

  • Dancing Wheels allows dancers with and without wheelchairs the chance to express themselves through movement

  • The nonprofit provides educational and outreach opportunities for adults and children as young as 4 years old

  • The professional dance company has performed worldwide

The Dancing Wheels Company offers people of all abilities the chance to express themselves through dance. 

Mary Verdi-Fletcher’s known what she’s wanted to do practically her whole life. 

“From the time I was 3 years old, I had said that I wanted to be a dancer, and people didn’t take me serious back then,” she said. 

That’s because Verdi-Fletcher was born with spina bifida. She gets around in a wheelchair. 

“I danced as a young person in my home with my mom, but there wasn’t really any place for people with disabilities to go to dance classes,” she said. 

So, she made her own place: the Dancing Wheels Company. It’s the first physically integrated dance company in the country. 

“I had such a great passion for it that I wanted everybody to appreciate it and to participate that didn’t have those opportunities in the past,” Verdi-Fletcher said. 

What started out as social dancing with one partner has grown to a professional dance company of ten dancers, with and without disabilities.

“To be able to dance on a stage or in any space, it’s a very freeing experience,” she said. “It’s like flying.”

The group performs around the world, challenging people’s perceptions. 

“It really has been created as a different kind of art form,” Verdi-Fletcher said. “A new form of art. A new way of moving.”

The nonprofit has been enhancing accessibility to the arts for more than 40 years. 

“Your disability isn’t at the forefront of what you’re doing, but your artistry is,” she said. 

In addition to the professional dance company, Dancing Wheels also holds classes teaching artful ways of moving to disabled and non-disabled students age 4 to adult. One of the organization’s goals is to be able to provide transportation for students to attend their classes. 

Verdi-Fletcher said educational opportunities are limited for someone in a wheelchair to get a degree in dance. 

“I want to open the depth and breadth of training for individuals with disabilities that want to be a part of the dance scene as choreographers, or teachers themselves, or dancers,” she said. 

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