Natifah White and Ian Abott

About the research

This research brings together Midlands based artists Natifah White and Ian Abbott

around shared questions of Hip Hop dance and archiving. Our vision for this residency is to develop tools and practices for Hip Hop dance archiving, expanding how it’s understood and shared in the UK. We will draw from our individual practices, invite international guests into the studio, invent new tools, and develop an experimental methodology for Hip Hop dance archiving. 

We’re interested in what might sit alongside lens-based approaches to archiving in Hip Hop dance. While film and photographic documentation are important, we also ask: what else? How else might we imagine and document our Hip Hop futures and pasts? We’re curious where these conversations pause, what patterns emerge in responses to archiving, and how this may influence—or limit—how Hip Hop dance archiving is imagined. 

About Natifah and Ian

Natifah White focuses on embodied and democratised approaches to archiving in Hip-Hop dance. A pivotal trip to New York allowed her to explore how Hip-Hop dance knowledge moves through our bodies and relationships receiving mentorship from Hip-Hop artist-archivists Tatiana Desadourin and Martha Diaz. Following this, she joined Martha’s International Hip-Hop Research Group. 

Ian Abbott has worked in Hip Hop dance for 17 years. His work includes working with Second To None on four Vile Style jams, creating the Hip Hop Dance Summit in 2015, interviewing 40+ contributors for the Hip Hop Dance Almanac (2018), commissioning 65+ essays for Ink Cypher (2021) and in 2025 he created and led the first Hip Hop Dance Writing Laboratory in Hong Kong. 

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Photos By Rocio Chacon (left) & Odd Venture (right)