The Association Jant-Bi/Ecole des Sables, International Center for Traditional and Contemporary African dances’ objective is to organize professional dance training for dancers from all over Africa in traditional and contemporary African and Western Dances dance as well as to develop and promote contemporary African dance.
The Ecole des Sables is located at Toubab Dialaw, about 50 kilometers south of Dakar/Senegal. It is a school teaching theoretical and practical classes as well as a laboratory for researches and a venue for meetings and exchanges, for conferences and artistic residencies. The Centre is equipped with 2 dance spaces « Kër Aloopho » (Aloopho’s house), 400 m2 with a sand floor and the Henriette Bathily space, 280 m2 with a professional Western standard dance floor, 24 bungalows for accommodation, a restaurant, a conference room and an infirmary.




Since 1998, the school organizes on a regular basis professional training programs for African dancers and choreographers, the African Diaspora and dancers from all over the world.
Nearly 300 dancers from 28 different African countries have benefited from high quality technical training programs with renowned African and Western teachers. These training programs feature courses in choreography , improvisation and stage technique, as well as classes in traditional dance and African and Western contemporary dance. The highpoints of all these workshops are the moments when trainees teach to each other their own specific traditional dances.


The Ecole des Sables is also the structure which hosts and manages the company Jant-Bi. Directed by Germaine Acogny, it includes 10 male dancers and 5 Senegalese musicians.
The company’s creations take place at the Ecole des Sables. Until now there are 4 :
Le Coq est mort (1999), Fagaala (2003), Waxtaan (2007) and Les écailles de la mémoire/The scales of memory (2009) in collaboration with a New York based company, the Urban Bush Women. The Jant-bi company has performed to numerous audiences on all continents.




The Ecole des Sables was created in 1994 and is directed by the dancer-choreographer Germaine Acogny and her German husband Helmut Vogt.
Between 1977 and 1982, Germaine Acogny was artistic director of the emblematic MUDRA AFRIQUE School of the Performing Arts created by Maurice Bejart and the Senegalese president and poet Leopold Sedar Senghor in Dakar. Ever since, she dances, choreographs and teaches all over the world. Germaine Acogny has created her very own technique of Modern African Dance.