Open Arms Dance Project creates greater joy and compassion with dance that opens hearts, minds, and arms.

Open Arms Dance Project is a community of dancers with diverse bodies, ages, and abilities, creating powerful art together in Boise, Idaho since 2008. As a dance company with a range of physical and neuro-diversity, Open Arms Dance Project has a mission to create greater joy and compassion with dance that opens hearts, minds, and arms.

You can find us performing everywhere from city sidewalks to main stages, including the Morrison Center for the Performing Arts. We carry our art and advocacy to school age audiences through our Upstanders with Open Arms anti-bullying program and Spiraling, our new one hour compassion building program for middle and high school students, both in partnership with the Wassmuth Center for Human Rights.

Beautifully Imperfect

May 8th & 9th, 2025

Pioneer Room, 6th Floor | Jack’s Urban Meeting Place

Beautifully Imperfect is an uplifting dance concert celebrating imperfection in ourselves and the natural world. Movement inspired by Fibonacci sequences that form golden spirals is interwoven with the Japanese aesthetic of Wabi-Sabi. Western ideals of beauty, balance, and proportion contrast with rustic roughness, asymmetry and impermanence valued in the East.

What does this look like in a dance concert? It’s like nothing you’ve ever experienced - but wished you had and now you can! Our intergenerational and inclusive dance company will perform co-created choreography. You’ll hear music from around the world, plus some familiar, toe tappin’ songs. The culminating effect will be surprising, validating, and absolutely uplifting for all who attend!

THURSDAY, May 8th, 10:30am Field Trip Registration

FRIDAY, May 9th, 7:00pm PUBLIC PERFORMANCE

UPCOMING EVENTS

April 28 - May 1, 2025

IDAHO GIVES
When we see dancers of all abilities sharing the stage, something powerful happens:
We feel hope.
We feel connection.
We feel moved.
That’s the magic of inclusive dance—it reminds us of the resilience of the human spirit, the beauty in difference, and the impact of true belonging.
Inspired by those who have seen Open Arms Dance Project in action and our dancers whose lives have been personally moved by their experiences, we are excited to announce our Movement is Moving campaign.
The campaign kicks off during the Idaho Gives event, starting Monday, April 28.
During the three-day fundraiser, we will highlight the community that makes this work possible—the artists, teachers, and most importantly, supporters of this movement.

Donate to Dance!
May 8 & 9, 2025

BEAUTIFULLY IMPERFECT
JUMP’s 6th floor Pioneer Room
Thursday 5/8, 10:30am, Field Trip Performance:
Only $3 per student and free for teachers and chaperones. Bring your students to experience what one 4th grade teacher described as “the best field trip we’ve ever taken.”
Friday 5/9, 7pm, Public Performance:
Tickets $10-$20 with 50% discounted tickets for artists, people with disabilities, seniors, and those in the military. Still need support attending our show? Please just reach out to OpenArmsDanceProject@gmail.com

View JUMP Campus Map

“This dance is about how I envisioned my life, in a spirit of sharing and hope, during a time of grief. It is based on a poem I wrote in 2004, titled, ‘How Should My Life Go?’”

- Gail C. Hawkins, age 75

Root. Grow. Release. Repeat.

Root, Grow, Release, Repeat features the solo choreography of 12 Open Arms Dance Project dancers woven together by Artistic Director Megan Brandel and Cinematographer April Frame. It was created during online rehearsals in the Fall of 2020 and filmed at the Idaho Botanical Garden in Boise, Idaho. Many dancers made full artistic choices in creating their own solos, while the natural, non-choreographed movement of other dancers was celebrated. The descriptive, poetic script makes this film accessible for viewers who are blind or low vision and adds a layer of artistry for all viewers.

“I made this dance because Open Arms makes me feel very awesome.”

- Keely Burns, age 25

“I created this solo because many of us had to “slow down” this past year. I wanted to show that in slowing down my hope is you find peace. Feel the air…breath.”

- Shirley Hurley, age 64

Flipping the Script

Go behind-the-scenes of the Open Arms Dance Project in Boise as it rehearses for its biggest concert ever, and then performs. You’ll also meet some of the members of this inclusive, multi-generational company, which includes dancers with disabilities and others who identify as able-bodied.

I love dance. I just love the ability you have to express yourself through movement.”

- Heather Marie

Box me inside/ Outside the box

Box Me Inside/Outside the Box: A Movement Memoir, March 2020-March 2021 was conceived in June 2020 and created during a 10-day artist residency at Surel’s Place in Garden City, Idaho, in October 2020. It was completed and filmed in March 2021 in Ms. Brandel's home office/dining room in Boise and the Owyhee mountain range outside of Marsing, Idaho. Essential collaborators in creating this piece were April Frame, Jessie Proksa, and Anne Boyles.

Movement invention came from reoccurring pandemic themes: -touching surfaces with body parts other than hands, -helping kids with schoolwork, -home projects, -fighting to concentrate in a noisy home, -massive changes, -constant adapting, -quarantining/freezing -starting again, -escapes into Nature and creative projects.

View more of our Dance Films

“When I’m dancing I feel free to express my emotions without fear of being judged.”

- Heather Marie, OADP Dancer & Ambassador

“It makes me happy that I’m dancing.”

- Hava Fisherman, OADP Dancer & Ambassador

Donate Here

Donations to Open Arms Dance Project help provide scholarships, costumes, and cover operational costs that the sliding scale tuition is not able to cover. Some seasons nearly half our dancers are given scholarships. All donations support us in fulfilling our mission of creating greater joy and compassion in the community with dance that opens hearts, minds, and arms.

Thank you so much!