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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

Announcing: ‘Dancing with the Derby Dracula’ Funded by the AHRC IAA, we are working with with the Derby Dracula to deliver a series of dance workshops for the public and local dancers to create a performance inspired by Derby’s vampiric history.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

The Danse Macabre Crew at the International Gothic Association conference @universityofhull. Fresh from our amazing dance session 'Do the Robot'.

An image of the members of Macabre Danse dressed in gothic outfits.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 31/10/2025

Its the grand finale. Our Dancing Dead Girl for Day 31 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse is of course Lady Gaga youtu.be/xGaZBfJOyAc?...

youtu.be

Lady Gaga - The Dead Dance (Official Music Video)

YouTube video by LadyGagaVEVO

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 30/10/2025

Day 30 of #31DaysofDanseMacabre and today's dancing dead girl is the sacrifical maiden from Igor Stravinsky's 'The Rites of Spring' (1913). Pic: Pina Bausch's choreography, 1984. Performance view, Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York, 2017.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 30/10/2025

Day 29 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse and our Dancing Dead Girl takes the form of a swan. Not, as you might expectation, Odette from Swan Lake but the Dying Swan.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 29/10/2025

Welcome, foolish mortals to day 28 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse where we invite you to watch the Waltzing Dead, also knows as the dancing ghosts from the ballroom in the Haunted Mansion.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 28/10/2025

Day 27 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse and children can be such monsters. Abigail (2024) is a reimagining of Universal's Dracula's Daughter and sees a group of criminals recruiting to kidnap the daughter of a wealthy businessman. However, said child is no ordinary ballerina...

Alisha Weir dancing mid turn as Abigail wearing a blood splattered white tutu

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

Day 26 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse presents the Dancing Dead (Girls) of Christopher Bruce’s 1981 Ghost Dances. It tells stories of love and compassion, as death – in the form of the ‘ghost dancers’ – interrupts the daily lives of a series of ordinary people.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

A semi-dead, semi-dancing girl for Day 25 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse as we visit one (of many) options from Matthew Bourne's reimagined contemporary ballets in the form of Aurora from Sleeping Beauty: A Gothic Romance.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

For Day 24 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse we present to you Lily Frankenstein, our Dancing Dead Girl played by Billie Piper.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

We're playing catch up at Danse Macabre HQ after a hectic pre-Halloweek weekend. Bear with us as we bring you up to speed in all things #31DaysOfMacabreDanse

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 24/10/2025

For Day 23 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse, we return to the theme of dancing dead girls in white with 'Dr Semmelweiz' (2023) starring Mark Rylance, about Dr Ignaz Semmelweis' work to prevent postpartum infection. His work was dismissed, leading to a nervous breakdown, and he died in an asylum.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 22/10/2025

Day 22 #31DaysOfMacabreDanse presents the vampire bat ballet sequence from Louis Feuillade's silent film serial Les Vampires (1913-15). In Episode Two - The Ring That Kills ballerina Marfa Koutiloff (Stacia Napierkowska) performs as a vampire bat en pointe but dies on stage.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 21/10/2025

For Day 22 of #31DaysofMacbreDanse, we have the Danse Macabre crew on Romancing the Gothic (www.youtube.com/@RomancingTh...). The image is from our screening of Guy Maddin's 'Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary' (see Day 15) for Dracula in Derby conference.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 21/10/2025

A belated day 20 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse with the classic novel of death, a young woman and dance: 'Bruges-la-Morte' (1892) by Georges Rodenbach. The narrative follows a widower haunted by his dead wife, and still living amongst her relics. Image: Fernand Khnopff's cover design, 1892.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 19/10/2025

For Day 19 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse, our dancing dead girl is the Prima Ballerina (Summer Glau) in 'Waiting in the Wings', Angel (S3: E13). In this episode, a ballerina is cursed to dance the same ballet, nightly, forever. To break the spell, she must dance the wrong steps leading to her death.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 19/10/2025

Some goth rock melodrama for your #31DaysOfMacabreDanse Day 18 with Creeper. An example of theatrical metal, the band includes worldbuilding and story arcs with their albums, creating personas for the members and expanding the stories in their music videos.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 17/10/2025

Our Dancing Dead Girl for Day 17 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse is Monster High's Draculaura. Daughter of Dracula, our girl is harbouring a secret; she might be a Vampire but she's also a Witch and the two are mortal enemies.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 16/10/2025

Let me in a your window for Day 16 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse. The debut single from Kate Bush, Wuthering Heights, released in 1978, is a self penned number sung from the point of view of Cathy's ghost.

Stills from Kate Bush music video for Wuthering Heights, dressed in white in soft lighting and fog on stage

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 15/10/2025

Day 15 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse and it's Guy Maddin's 'Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary' (2002), a film of Royal Winnipeg's Baller adaptation of 'Dracula' (1897). Filmed in the silent film tradition, the addition of colours - golden, green and red - add depth and symbolism.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 14/10/2025

Day 14 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse, and we turn to a lost a film, 'The Dance of Death' (1919). Written by Fritz Lang, and directed by Otto Ripert, this silent horror film centres on a dangerous dancing woman (Sascha Gura).

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 13/10/2025

Day 13 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse and it's unlucky for some. In this case, the Treginnis family in 'The Haunted Ballroom', first performed in 1934 with music and libretto by Geoffrey Toye and choreography by Ninette de Valois. Image: Alicia Markova and Robert Helpmann

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 12/10/2025

Day 12 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse brings a Dancing Dead Girl from the mind of Rob Zombie. Loving Dead Girl (1998) was the second single from Zombie's Hellbilly Deluxe album and features Sheri Moon as the titular Dean Girl.

media.tenor.com

they pray for the living dead girl is written on a blackboard

ALT: they pray for the living dead girl is written on a blackboard

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 11/10/2025

Day 11 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse is a recurrent motif in art and media. Death and the Madien evolved from the Danse Macabre (yes, where we took the inspiration for our name) and became popular first during the Renaisance and later revived in the Romantic era.

Sebald Beham: Die Dame und der Tod, 1541

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 10/10/2025

Day 10 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse and for your Friday night feast we bring you a colab between 2/3 of Danse Macabre and The Ghoul Guides Association youtu.be/R6n5TGVfb6o?...

youtu.be

Gothic Dance | Ghoul Guides Association

YouTube video by The Ghoul Guides

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 09/10/2025

Day 9 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse, and our dancing dead girls are stitching a seam across the eye. Season 2 of So You Think You Can Dance in 2006 gave us a zombie group number to Ramalama (Bang Bang) by Roísín Murphy

Still of the female dancers from season two of So You Think You Can Dance, dressed in zombie makeup and dance hall style costumes

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 08/10/2025

Day 8 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse and we wonder 'to sleep, perchance to dream' (Hamlet, 3:1) with 'La Sonnambula'. Premiering in 1946, at the City Center of Music and Drama, New York, it was created by George Balanchine.

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Maria J Pérez Cuervo @mjpcuervo.com · 06/10/2025

Alice in Wonderland (Jonathan Miller, 1966), my favourite adaptation.

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Efram Sera-Shriar @dreframss.bsky.social · 07/10/2025

I'm delighted to be delivering a talk on 23 Oct 2025 btwn 5–6.30pm (BST) for @gothicauob.bsky.social My talk is titled: ‘Battling Satan in Your Underpants: Censoring Capcom’s Ghosts ‘n Goblins Videogame during the Age of American Satanic Panic’ Details 👇 uobgothica.wordpress.com/2025/10/06/s...

uobgothica.wordpress.com

Session Thirty Seven: Video Game Gothic

We are especially excited to announce that our first Gothica session of the 2025/26 academic year will be Video Game Gothic with our special guest speaker Dr Efram Sera-Shriar on Zoom on Thursday 2…

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Dr Emily Vincent @dremilyvincent.bsky.social · 07/10/2025

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 07/10/2025

Day 7 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse and we move to the past once more with 'La Bayadère' (1877). Consisting of four acts and seven tableaux, the original choreography was by Marius Petipa, music by Ludwig Minky and libretto by Sergei Khudekov.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 06/10/2025

Day 6 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse and today we are looking at Frau Troffea, reputedly the first recorded victim of the 1518 dancing plague that started in Strasburg, Alsace. Image: Engraving, Hendrik Hondius, based on the work of Pieter Brueghel.

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Cat Irving @anatomicalcat.bsky.social · 05/10/2025

I ended up spending longer in Bologna than expected this week, and this was one of the unexpected delights of that extra time. It’s an early sixteenth century tondelli - round stained glass window - showing the Triumph of Death, made in the German regions, and based on an engraving by Albrecht Dürer

a portion of stained glass showing a skeletal figure in a winding sheet flying in the air and holding a scroll

À différent portion of the same stained glass showing a skeletal figure wrapped in a sheet brandishing an arrow and riding into a crowd.

The full round stained glass showing the precocious two figures with Germanic text rubbing around the outside. The colour palette is yellow and brown

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Lynn Huggins-Cooper @hugginscooper.bsky.social · 15/02/2025

Best way to spend Saturday - so much gothic delight in one place! Just watched a great talk by @macabredanse.bsky.social 's Kate Harvey and a brilliant writing workshop with @icysedgwick.bsky.social gave me ideas for my YA :) Makes my dark little gothic heart happy. #WritingHorror #HorrorStudies

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Recs be havin' ya @recs-be.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

@hauntedshores.bsky.social @macabredanse.bsky.social been doing final tech check for remote attendance, excited for Wednesday morning. Got my coffee machine ready! #GothicStudiesNerd

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Recs be havin' ya @recs-be.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Day 1 of #unquietshores conference is now underway. In session 1 - echoes from antiquity (parallel sessions) I've been learning about the death of Pan in literature around the 1910 period. #gothicConference @hauntedshores.bsky.social @macabredanse.bsky.social

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Recs be havin' ya @recs-be.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Luna (currently cat sitting) is listening quietly to Veres Ottilia presenting "nobody underneath a big wave: sedimentary remnants in Alice Oswald's Nobody: a hymn to the sea" #unquietshores session 1a @hauntedshores.bsky.social @macabredanse.bsky.social

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Recs be havin' ya @recs-be.bsky.social · 20/06/2025

That's it, no more #unquietshores #unquietshores2025 posting from me, thanks 2everyone involved from @hauntedshores.bsky.social @macabredanse.bsky.social +uni of Edinburgh. Hopefully didn't annoy everyone with my tangents...Counting the appearances of the god Pan (4!) Or love for Black Phillip.🐐

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Amy Beddows @amybeddows.bsky.social · 20/06/2025

Had an absolute blast at @hauntedshores.bsky.social and @macabredanse.bsky.social wonderful 'Unquiet Shores' conference. I got to speak on trauma, water, and sound in horror film, with a very generous reception to my (typical) insistence on inserting trauma and gender into EVERYTHING. Cheers!

media.tenor.com

a black and white photo of a woman holding another woman 's head in a dark room .

Alt: a black and white photo of a woman holding another woman's head in a dark room (from the J-horror film, Ju-On).

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Mimi Manyin @mimimanyin.bsky.social · 26/06/2025

Excited to teach a writing workshop & talk about Jane Campion’s “The Piano” plus uncanny sounds & images at the Unquiet Shores conference @edinburghnapier.bsky.social! Thanks @hauntedshores.bsky.social @macabredanse.bsky.social for a lovely time! #hauntedshores #unquietshores #creativewriting #piano

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Mimi Manyin @mimimanyin.bsky.social · 26/06/2025

Taking my Silent Reading Party wherever I go! Big thanks to @hauntedshores.bsky.social @macabredanse.bsky.social for the chance to play music at the Unquiet Shores conference @edinburghnapier.bsky.social! 🎹🔊 #silentreadingparty #silentwritingparty #hauntedshores #unquietshores #pianoimprovisation

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Karen Graham @kartook.bsky.social · 04/10/2025

It took me ages to get those screenshots from the video. I'm rather pleased with myself for this one.

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Karen Graham @kartook.bsky.social · 01/10/2025

Over on the Danse Macabre socials, we are about to start our epic annual daily gothic dance post for the whole of October. Follow along on twitter, bluesky, or Instagram with #31DaysOfMacabreDanse for a whole month on Dancing Dead Girls.

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 05/10/2025

Day 5 of #31DaysofMacabreDanse and we have dancing, dead cheerleaders in Lorn's 'Acid Rain' music video.The dead cheerleader is a favourite Halloween costume, but here the effect is more melancholy. Despite the contemporary setting and the movement away from ballet . . .

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 04/10/2025

Day 4 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse is for the Emos. Helena was the second singe from My Chemical Romance's 2004 album Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge. Often considered their breakthrough commercial hit, the song was a tribute to Gerard and Mikey Way's grandmother.

media.tenor.com

a woman says what 's the worst that i can say with candles in the background

ALT: a woman says what 's the worst that i can say with candles in the background

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 04/10/2025

Day 3 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse and we're back on stage with the romantic ballet La Sylphide. There's men in kilts, witches, dark forests, and, of course, the ethereal Sylphs and our inevitable dead dancing girl

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Dr Emily Vincent @dremilyvincent.bsky.social · 03/10/2025

Tis the #Halloween séance season 👻 and a great time to read the #TalesOfTheWeird @britishlibrary.bsky.social collections! Summoned to the Séance features 14 lesser-known stories from Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G. Wells, Florence Marryat, F. Scott Fitzgerald and more. Really enjoyed editing this! 👻

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

Day 2 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse and we're off to the vampire masquerade ball of Van Helsing (2004). Our dancing dead girl Anna Valerious waltzes in a glorious blood red gown, and is dipped by Dracula in front of a mirror to emphasise that she is surrounded by dead bodies (in the form of vampires)

Still from Van Helsing (2004) where Dracula dances with Anna and dips her in front of a mirror. All that is shown is Anna in her blood red ballgown, showing that everyone else in the room are vampires

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Macabre Danse @macabredanse.bsky.social · 01/10/2025

Day 1 of #31DaysOfMacabreDanse is for the OG Dancing Dead Girl Giselle. In this 1841 ballet, peasant girl Giselle dances herself to death* when betrayed by her lover Albrect and returns from the grave summoned by the Wilis - vengeful female spirits.

media.tenor.com

a black and white photo of a ballet dancer in a white dress

ALT: a black and white photo of a ballet dancer in a white dress

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