"The body can tell truths that words can't reach."
In 1983 a young Benji Reid stopped to watch a breakdance crew outside Manchester Arndale Centre. Their name was Broken Glass. Inspired, he threw himself into early UK hip hop, taking on B-boys in dance-offs all over the country. Benji soon became a Broken Glass member, winning national break dance and body popping championships. After a stint at the Northern School of Contemporary Dance, he was made lead dancer for Soul II Soul on their global stadium tour of 1990. Returning home to pursue physical and protest performance, Benji then co-created hip hop theatre, a groundbreaking fusion of poetry, dance and live music. He was creative director of revered company Breaking Cycles until 2018, and has since reinvented himself as a photographer. His award-winning ‘choreo-photolism’ uses daringly staged scenes to explore identity, isolation, afro-futurism and more. Get ready for his 5 Good Things.
You started out as a body popper before joining legendary Manchester break dance crew Broken Glass. Can you tell us a bit about your involvement in the early UK hip hop scene? What was it like?
The early days were wild. Before Broken Glass I was just trying to make a name for myself, which meant taking on anybody who stepped up. Back in the ‘80s we had youth clubs where kids from different schools would gather. That’s how we got to know each other’s styles. But the real spot where we threw down was a club called Sands in Stretford, Manchester. Hewan Clarke was resident DJ, and the place was electric. It was like the Wild West. When you went there, you went to dance—beer mat in back pocket, ready to hit the floor.
We never called it ‘battling’ — it was always “challenging.” A typical challenge would kick off with a DJ dropping an electro tune, say 'ET Boogie'. As soon as it came on, B-boys and poppers would hit the floor. One dancer would start throwing down, a circle would form, strobe lights flashing. The energy would get more and more intense. We’d start taking each other on. I’d wait until a challenge was in full swing before stepping into the circle, and when I did it was always to loud cheers. By then I had a rep for being dope.
Clothes mattered as much as moves. I’d be rocking dungarees, boxing trainers, a diamond-back top. BMX was big for me then too, and that influenced the way I dressed and carried myself. The whole scene was part dance, part fashion, part theatre. Those early challenges shaped everything that came after.
Not long after that, you won a place at the Northern School of Contemporary Dance in Leeds. From body popping at clubs and events to studying ballet and dance as an art form. How did this jump shape your expression, taking you from the person and dancer you’d been to what you would become?
I still say NSCD was the best three years of my life. I was like a sponge. Every week there was another show to see, another world opening up. It was a whole culture change. New city, new school, new classmates. We were thrown in at the deep end: classical ballet first thing, then contemporary dance, music history, choreography. I loved choreography and lighting design from the start.
The NSCD was where I was introduced to protest theatre from South Africa—actors and writers who opposed apartheid. Artists like Athol Fugard, John Kani, and Winston Ntshona opened my eyes to how performance could be political, how it could speak to something bigger than just movement. Their theatre wasn’t just performance, it was resistance, it was survival, it was truth-telling.
If you look closely, there’s a direct correlation between protest and hip-hop theatre. Both are political. Both are what I’d call total theatre in that they utilise everything: singing, rapping, traditional African dance, popping and breaking, and they’re often performed in non-traditional spaces. Both forms are countercultural, born from struggle and creativity, and they carry that same spirit of defiance.
Looking back at the transitions of your early career, breakdancing to the dance school to world tours with Soul II Soul, founding your own dance and theatre company, what would you say spurred you on? Were there any inspirations or ambitions?
What spurred me on was hunger—pure hunger. From the youth clubs to NSCD then touring with Soul II Soul, I always felt like there was more to discover, more to express. I didn’t want to stand still.
My inspirations were everywhere: the crews and dancers I battled with, the teachers who challenged me at NSCD, the musicians and artists I toured alongside. But deeper than that, it was ambition. I wanted to create my own language, my own way of being in the world.
Founding my own physical theatre company was part of that drive. I didn’t just want to perform in someone else’s vision. I wanted to build spaces where the work could come directly from my spirit, my community, my experience. That’s what kept me moving forward. I believe that physical theatre can be more than entertainment. It can be a lifeline, a way of speaking truths that might otherwise remain unsaid.
Although you continually reinvent yourself, looking at your early journey, it seems logical and evolutionary. How natural did it feel at the time? What about the pivot to photography, can you tell us a bit about how that felt and how you pulled it off?
From the outside my journey might look seamless—like one step naturally led to the next—but living it was very different. At the time every move felt risky, like stepping into the unknown. Reinvention wasn’t a choice; it was survival.
The pivot to photography was one of those leaps—an accidental discovery. When I lost my company Breaking Cycles and was clearing out my office, I found a camera that was meant to be used to document my shows but had never been touched. At that point I had nothing, no more work coming in. A whole new wave of artists were becoming flavour of the month and I felt pushed aside. So I retreated into myself.
I taught myself photography through trial and error. My daughter Luna became my first muse, my main subject, and through her I began to develop my eye. That’s where I started to see how movement, theatre and image could come together in a single frame.
From the outside it might look like a natural progression, but the truth is I was lost. I felt depressed and invisible. Pulling it off came down to the same thing that had carried me from the outset: vision and persistence. I trusted that if I stayed true to my instincts, if I kept shaping work from a deep and honest place, the path would reveal itself. And in hindsight, yes, it looks evolutionary. But in the moment, it was just me taking another leap of faith.
Your photography is so original. Otherworldly and transportive, yet fun and theatrical. How does exploration and play feature in your work?
Play is central to my practice. I think of choreo-photolism as a space where imagination, movement, and theatre collide, and play is what allows me to unlock those collisions.
For me, exploration always starts with curiosity—asking, what if? What if gravity didn’t apply? What if a moment of despair could look like flight? What if we staged the impossible and made it visible? That spirit of play opens the door to other worlds.
But play isn’t just lightness, it’s risk, vulnerability, freedom—the kind of freedom children carry naturally before the world tells them to shrink. In my work, I’m constantly trying to reclaim that energy, to keep that child alive. It’s where the theatricality comes from, but also where the honesty is.
So yes, my images may look otherworldly, but they’re born from that simple act of playing with possibilities—letting the imagination lead, and trusting it to take me and the viewer somewhere unexpected.
The dance floor. The dance company. The home. The body. Would it be fair to say that your work is about creating stages in unexpected ways and places? Could you talk a bit about that?
I try not to think of my work purely in terms of dance, because it’s always been broader. It’s multidisciplinary, drawing from theatre, photography, visual art, even poetry at times. For me the stage is not limited to the theatre or the dance floor. The stage can be anywhere—even inside the imagination.
I’m interested in creating stages in unexpected places: in the home, on the street, in the body itself, or the way a photograph freezes a moment of tension. Sometimes the stage is literal, sometimes it’s invisible. What matters is a sense of presence—the idea that this is a space where something transformative might happen.
That’s why I call my practice choreo-photolism. It’s about staging stories in ways people don’t expect, and reminding us that performance, ritual, and art can unfold anywhere life is happening.
So much of Benji Reid seems to be about the power of perception. Playing with communication in physical ways. Why does this interest you? Could you maybe hone in on why you want to say the things you do?
I say things that need to be said. That’s the starting point. I’ve always been drawn to communicating physically—through movement, through images—because the body can tell truths that words can’t reach.
Why does it interest me? Because it’s necessary. Voices like mine weren’t always heard when I was growing up. Our stories could be ignored or erased. Art gave me a way to put those stories back into the room—loud, undeniable, present.
So much of my work is about shifting perceptions — taking what people think they know and bending it, twisting it, so they’re forced to see differently. Whether it’s weightlessness, vulnerability or resilience, I want to communicate things that matter.
How has the dial turned in terms of your relationship with art? You’ve had such a long and interesting career. Does it fulfil and intrigue you in the same way today?
My relationship with art has shifted many times. In the beginning it was all fire. Pure hunger, adrenaline, the thrill of movement and expression. Later, it became about building — companies, shows, communities. Then at certain points it became about survival, holding onto art when everything else seemed to fall away.
Today art still fulfils me, only in a different way. I’m less interested in proving myself and more interested in deepening the work, asking harder questions, creating space for vulnerability, making images and performances that might speak to someone else’s survival.
Art still intrigues me because it’s never finished. Every time I step into the studio or behind the camera, I’m reminded that art is a dialogue between me and the world, and that the dialogue keeps changing. The hunger is still there, but it’s tempered with reflection. I’d say I’m more patient now, but just as restless.
What contemporary artists excite you? Why does their work resonate?
Mike Tyson excites me, not just as a fighter but as a story of struggle and transformation. To rise from where he came from and become heavyweight champion of the world is powerful in itself. But what really inspires me is how he had to shed the idea of “Iron Mike,” that mask of invincibility, and begin the journey of finding his true self. That takes courage.
Then there’s J Dilla. He’s like a saint to me. He heard music differently. His beats were so inventive, so playful, yet deeply felt. Dilla reminds me that art can bend time, rewrite the rules, and still stay rooted in soul.
Both of them, in their own ways, embody what I chase in my work: resilience, reinvention, and the ability to shape something utterly original out of struggle.
Finally, a quick two-hander about fashion. You’re a big hip hop head. How has hip hop affected the way we dress? How has it shaped your style?
I’m a hip hop head in spirit. Maybe not so much with the new music these days, but the spirit of hip hop— making something from nothing—has never left me.
Hip-hop has always been bigger than sound. It’s about attitude, identity, style. From the early days it shaped how we carried ourselves. The clothes became a kind of armour, a way of declaring who you were.
Now you can see hip hop’s influence on me, not in a nostalgic way, but in how I use clothes as a mode of storytelling, self-presentation as an extension of art. For me, hip hop’s spirit of reinvention is permanent. It’s fundamental to how I live and create.
This last part is where we ask you to send some cultural inspiration out into the
world, recommending 5 Good Things and the reasons why you chose them.
A restaurant or cafe you like in your city.
Pull Up, the Caribbean restaurant in Manchester centre. Sharon, who runs it, is amazing. It feels like eating at home every time I go. The food, the atmosphere, the welcome. It’s all heart.
A film everyone should watch.
Delicatessen. A surreal, darkly comic film set in a post-apocalyptic world. It’s strange, beautiful, and unsettling — full of invention, texture, imagination. It really stays with you.
A book everyone should read.
The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin. It’s a reminder that creativity is not just about making things, it’s about how we live. I think every artist, or anyone searching for their voice, should read it.
A musical album or artist who means something to you.
Don Blackman by Don Blackman.
Where you’d send someone if they were visiting your city or hometown for the first time.
Factory International. It’s the cultural heartbeat of Manchester. If you’re visiting for the first time, that’s where you’ll feel the city’s creative energy at its best.
5 Good Things - Benji Reid, Manchester, UK
"The body can tell truths that words can't reach."
In 1983 a young Benji Reid stopped to watch a breakdance crew outside Manchester Arndale Centre. Their name was Broken Glass. Inspired, he threw himself into early UK hip hop, taking on B-boys in dance-offs all over the country. Benji soon became a Broken Glass member, winning national break dance and body popping championships. After a stint at the Northern School of Contemporary Dance, he was made lead dancer for Soul II Soul on their global stadium tour of 1990. Returning home to pursue physical and protest performance, Benji then co-created hip hop theatre, a groundbreaking fusion of poetry, dance and live music. He was creative director of revered company Breaking Cycles until 2018, and has since reinvented himself as a photographer. His award-winning ‘choreo-photolism’ uses daringly staged scenes to explore identity, isolation, afro-futurism and more. Get ready for his 5 Good Things.
You started out as a body popper before joining legendary Manchester break dance crew Broken Glass. Can you tell us a bit about your involvement in the early UK hip hop scene? What was it like?
The early days were wild. Before Broken Glass I was just trying to make a name for myself, which meant taking on anybody who stepped up. Back in the ‘80s we had youth clubs where kids from different schools would gather. That’s how we got to know each other’s styles. But the real spot where we threw down was a club called Sands in Stretford, Manchester. Hewan Clarke was resident DJ, and the place was electric. It was like the Wild West. When you went there, you went to dance—beer mat in back pocket, ready to hit the floor.
We never called it ‘battling’ — it was always “challenging.” A typical challenge would kick off with a DJ dropping an electro tune, say 'ET Boogie'. As soon as it came on, B-boys and poppers would hit the floor. One dancer would start throwing down, a circle would form, strobe lights flashing. The energy would get more and more intense. We’d start taking each other on. I’d wait until a challenge was in full swing before stepping into the circle, and when I did it was always to loud cheers. By then I had a rep for being dope.
Clothes mattered as much as moves. I’d be rocking dungarees, boxing trainers, a diamond-back top. BMX was big for me then too, and that influenced the way I dressed and carried myself. The whole scene was part dance, part fashion, part theatre. Those early challenges shaped everything that came after.
Not long after that, you won a place at the Northern School of Contemporary Dance in Leeds. From body popping at clubs and events to studying ballet and dance as an art form. How did this jump shape your expression, taking you from the person and dancer you’d been to what you would become?
I still say NSCD was the best three years of my life. I was like a sponge. Every week there was another show to see, another world opening up. It was a whole culture change. New city, new school, new classmates. We were thrown in at the deep end: classical ballet first thing, then contemporary dance, music history, choreography. I loved choreography and lighting design from the start.
The NSCD was where I was introduced to protest theatre from South Africa—actors and writers who opposed apartheid. Artists like Athol Fugard, John Kani, and Winston Ntshona opened my eyes to how performance could be political, how it could speak to something bigger than just movement. Their theatre wasn’t just performance, it was resistance, it was survival, it was truth-telling.
If you look closely, there’s a direct correlation between protest and hip-hop theatre. Both are political. Both are what I’d call total theatre in that they utilise everything: singing, rapping, traditional African dance, popping and breaking, and they’re often performed in non-traditional spaces. Both forms are countercultural, born from struggle and creativity, and they carry that same spirit of defiance.
Looking back at the transitions of your early career, breakdancing to the dance school to world tours with Soul II Soul, founding your own dance and theatre company, what would you say spurred you on? Were there any inspirations or ambitions?
What spurred me on was hunger—pure hunger. From the youth clubs to NSCD then touring with Soul II Soul, I always felt like there was more to discover, more to express. I didn’t want to stand still.
My inspirations were everywhere: the crews and dancers I battled with, the teachers who challenged me at NSCD, the musicians and artists I toured alongside. But deeper than that, it was ambition. I wanted to create my own language, my own way of being in the world.
Founding my own physical theatre company was part of that drive. I didn’t just want to perform in someone else’s vision. I wanted to build spaces where the work could come directly from my spirit, my community, my experience. That’s what kept me moving forward. I believe that physical theatre can be more than entertainment. It can be a lifeline, a way of speaking truths that might otherwise remain unsaid.
Although you continually reinvent yourself, looking at your early journey, it seems logical and evolutionary. How natural did it feel at the time? What about the pivot to photography, can you tell us a bit about how that felt and how you pulled it off?
From the outside my journey might look seamless—like one step naturally led to the next—but living it was very different. At the time every move felt risky, like stepping into the unknown. Reinvention wasn’t a choice; it was survival.
The pivot to photography was one of those leaps—an accidental discovery. When I lost my company Breaking Cycles and was clearing out my office, I found a camera that was meant to be used to document my shows but had never been touched. At that point I had nothing, no more work coming in. A whole new wave of artists were becoming flavour of the month and I felt pushed aside. So I retreated into myself.
I taught myself photography through trial and error. My daughter Luna became my first muse, my main subject, and through her I began to develop my eye. That’s where I started to see how movement, theatre and image could come together in a single frame.
From the outside it might look like a natural progression, but the truth is I was lost. I felt depressed and invisible. Pulling it off came down to the same thing that had carried me from the outset: vision and persistence. I trusted that if I stayed true to my instincts, if I kept shaping work from a deep and honest place, the path would reveal itself. And in hindsight, yes, it looks evolutionary. But in the moment, it was just me taking another leap of faith.
Your photography is so original. Otherworldly and transportive, yet fun and theatrical. How does exploration and play feature in your work?
Play is central to my practice. I think of choreo-photolism as a space where imagination, movement, and theatre collide, and play is what allows me to unlock those collisions.
For me, exploration always starts with curiosity—asking, what if? What if gravity didn’t apply? What if a moment of despair could look like flight? What if we staged the impossible and made it visible? That spirit of play opens the door to other worlds.
But play isn’t just lightness, it’s risk, vulnerability, freedom—the kind of freedom children carry naturally before the world tells them to shrink. In my work, I’m constantly trying to reclaim that energy, to keep that child alive. It’s where the theatricality comes from, but also where the honesty is.
So yes, my images may look otherworldly, but they’re born from that simple act of playing with possibilities—letting the imagination lead, and trusting it to take me and the viewer somewhere unexpected.
The dance floor. The dance company. The home. The body. Would it be fair to say that your work is about creating stages in unexpected ways and places? Could you talk a bit about that?
I try not to think of my work purely in terms of dance, because it’s always been broader. It’s multidisciplinary, drawing from theatre, photography, visual art, even poetry at times. For me the stage is not limited to the theatre or the dance floor. The stage can be anywhere—even inside the imagination.
I’m interested in creating stages in unexpected places: in the home, on the street, in the body itself, or the way a photograph freezes a moment of tension. Sometimes the stage is literal, sometimes it’s invisible. What matters is a sense of presence—the idea that this is a space where something transformative might happen.
That’s why I call my practice choreo-photolism. It’s about staging stories in ways people don’t expect, and reminding us that performance, ritual, and art can unfold anywhere life is happening.
So much of Benji Reid seems to be about the power of perception. Playing with communication in physical ways. Why does this interest you? Could you maybe hone in on why you want to say the things you do?
I say things that need to be said. That’s the starting point. I’ve always been drawn to communicating physically—through movement, through images—because the body can tell truths that words can’t reach.
Why does it interest me? Because it’s necessary. Voices like mine weren’t always heard when I was growing up. Our stories could be ignored or erased. Art gave me a way to put those stories back into the room—loud, undeniable, present.
So much of my work is about shifting perceptions — taking what people think they know and bending it, twisting it, so they’re forced to see differently. Whether it’s weightlessness, vulnerability or resilience, I want to communicate things that matter.
How has the dial turned in terms of your relationship with art? You’ve had such a long and interesting career. Does it fulfil and intrigue you in the same way today?
My relationship with art has shifted many times. In the beginning it was all fire. Pure hunger, adrenaline, the thrill of movement and expression. Later, it became about building — companies, shows, communities. Then at certain points it became about survival, holding onto art when everything else seemed to fall away.
Today art still fulfils me, only in a different way. I’m less interested in proving myself and more interested in deepening the work, asking harder questions, creating space for vulnerability, making images and performances that might speak to someone else’s survival.
Art still intrigues me because it’s never finished. Every time I step into the studio or behind the camera, I’m reminded that art is a dialogue between me and the world, and that the dialogue keeps changing. The hunger is still there, but it’s tempered with reflection. I’d say I’m more patient now, but just as restless.
What contemporary artists excite you? Why does their work resonate?
Mike Tyson excites me, not just as a fighter but as a story of struggle and transformation. To rise from where he came from and become heavyweight champion of the world is powerful in itself. But what really inspires me is how he had to shed the idea of “Iron Mike,” that mask of invincibility, and begin the journey of finding his true self. That takes courage.
Then there’s J Dilla. He’s like a saint to me. He heard music differently. His beats were so inventive, so playful, yet deeply felt. Dilla reminds me that art can bend time, rewrite the rules, and still stay rooted in soul.
Both of them, in their own ways, embody what I chase in my work: resilience, reinvention, and the ability to shape something utterly original out of struggle.
Finally, a quick two-hander about fashion. You’re a big hip hop head. How has hip hop affected the way we dress? How has it shaped your style?
I’m a hip hop head in spirit. Maybe not so much with the new music these days, but the spirit of hip hop— making something from nothing—has never left me.
Hip-hop has always been bigger than sound. It’s about attitude, identity, style. From the early days it shaped how we carried ourselves. The clothes became a kind of armour, a way of declaring who you were.
Now you can see hip hop’s influence on me, not in a nostalgic way, but in how I use clothes as a mode of storytelling, self-presentation as an extension of art. For me, hip hop’s spirit of reinvention is permanent. It’s fundamental to how I live and create.
This last part is where we ask you to send some cultural inspiration out into the
world, recommending 5 Good Things and the reasons why you chose them.
A restaurant or cafe you like in your city.
Pull Up, the Caribbean restaurant in Manchester centre. Sharon, who runs it, is amazing. It feels like eating at home every time I go. The food, the atmosphere, the welcome. It’s all heart.
A film everyone should watch.
Delicatessen. A surreal, darkly comic film set in a post-apocalyptic world. It’s strange, beautiful, and unsettling — full of invention, texture, imagination. It really stays with you.
A book everyone should read.
The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin. It’s a reminder that creativity is not just about making things, it’s about how we live. I think every artist, or anyone searching for their voice, should read it.
A musical album or artist who means something to you.
Don Blackman by Don Blackman.
Where you’d send someone if they were visiting your city or hometown for the first time.
Factory International. It’s the cultural heartbeat of Manchester. If you’re visiting for the first time, that’s where you’ll feel the city’s creative energy at its best.