STUDIO STORIES: REMINISCING ON TWIN CITIES DANCE HISTORY

Jennifer Hart - Hailed as a choreographer “with an imagination so exuberant that one could not be sure how one movement led to the next” and “not only inventive but heart-rending,” Jennifer Hart has been commissioned by Ballet Austin, Ballet Austin ll, Ballet Nouveau Colorado (now Wonderbound), James Sewell Ballet, Minnesota Dance Theater, The Walker Art Center's Momentum Series, The McKnight Fellowship for Dancers, Metropolitan Ballet Project, University of Kansas, University of Massachusetts, Lawrence Ballet Theatre, Halcyon Dance Project in San Francisco, and Merick Strategies for its production of Leonard Bernstein's “Mass” and “Icons of Broadway Holiday Spectacular.” In July, 2022, Hart was one of four choreographers selected for National Choreographers Initiative.In 2011, Hart was awarded a New York City Ballet Fellowship and won third place at the Saint-Sauveur International Choreography Competition. She received second place at Ballet Nouveau Colorado's choreography competition, and was one of three winners of the University of Kansas' competitive choreography competition. She was chosen three times to present work at Ballet Builders, New Choreographer's on Point in NYC. She was commissioned by University of Massachusetts in the fall of 2013; the work was chosen for the National College Dance Festival at the Kennedy Center, June 2014. In 2024, she was a finalist in the Palm Desert Choreography Festival.In 2014, she formed Performa/Dance with Ballet Austin dancer Edward Carr. Performa/Dance launched its inaugural show. Ignite: Three Works, in June, 2014. Her work for Performa/Dance was awarded four Austin Critic's Table awards for Best Short Work (“On Truth and Love”and "Camille: A Story of Art and Love"), Best Choreographer  ("Fellow Travelers" and “Murmuration"), and Best Dance Concert (Ignite: Three Works). Along with her work in concert dance, she has choreographed and performed cabaret shorts for nightclubs and television, and has begun working in video. She recently choreographed and co-directed the epic Bernstein's Mass, a work involving 300 performers.She trained at Minnesota Dance Theatre, Pacific Northwest Ballet and San Francisco Ballet. Her performing career includes Minnesota Dance Theater, Ballet of the Dolls, and L.A Chamber Ballet, as well as independent choreographers. She choreographs for Ballet Austin's apprentices and Fellowship recipients, teaches full-time in the academy and apprentice program, and serves as Curriculum Supervisor of the school where she sets syllabus and leads training for academy teachers.

Sam Aros-Mitchell (he/him) is an enrolled member of the Texas Band of Yaqui Indians and an interdisciplinary artist, scholar, and educator. His work spans performance, sound, light and scenic design, choreography, and embodied writing. Rooted in Indigenous cosmologies, his practice activates performance spaces as sacred sites of transformation, remembrance, and futurity. Through embodied scholarship, he interrogates colonial histories, uplifts BIPOC artistic excellence, and envisions just futures. Aros-Mitchell holds a Ph.D. in Drama and Theatre from the joint doctoral program at UC San Diego/UC Irvine, an MFA in Dance Theatre from UC San Diego, and a BFA from UC Santa Barbara. He is a 2025 Jerome Fellow and a 2023 McKnight Dance Fellow. Recently, he produced the inaugural Macalester Native Play Festival and will produce a week-long Indigenous arts festival in Mni Sota Makoce in November 2025, supported by the Minnesota State Arts Board. As a choreographer, his works include Ania Bwia Bwia Toochia , performed at Red Eye's Works in Progress (May 2023), and Finding Sentience , performed by Semaphore Dance Repertory (November 2023). Since 2017, Aros-Mitchell has collaborated with Rosy Simas Danse as a performer, teacher, and community engagement organizer, appearing in Skins (2018), Weave (2019), Simas' short film yödoishëndahgwa'geh (2021), and she lives on the road to war (2022–2024). He has also performed in Prairie/Concrete with Aniccha Arts (2023), Inner Blades of Grass (Soft), Inner Blades of Grass (Cured), Inner Blades of Grass (Bruised by the Weather) by Alutiiq/Sugpiaq multidisciplinary artist Tanya Lukin Linklater (2024), and Morgan Thorson's Untitled Night (2024).For more information, visit www.samarosmitchell.com

Mathew Janczewski's inquisitive, immersive and heartfelt approach to contemporary dance reaches beyond the surface and holds the viewer in its embrace. With over 40 works in his repertoire and more than two decades of experience as a choreographer, Mathew has cultivated a highly diverse and personalized style of movement. Increasingly, his performances explore pressing social issues, providing a platform for dialogue and action.Mathew's work has garnered praise in the Twin Cities and beyond. He has created commissioned works for companies such as Minnesota Dance Theater, Cleveland Repertory Co., aTrek Dance and Zenon Dance Company. He was the Bates Festival choreographer (2001), received the Sage Award for Outstanding Performance (2005) and won the McKnight Choreographers Fellowship (2005). In 2008, Dance Magazine named him as one of their “25 to Watch.”Shortly after receiving his degree in dance at the University of Minnesota, Mathew founded his own non-profit dance company, ARENA DANCES, in 1995. ARENA serves as the vehicle for his body of work and provides young, aging and underserved segments of the Twin Cities community with opportunities to experience the transformative power of dance.More about only the perverse fantasy can still save us here:https://walkerart.org/calendar/2025/mathew-janczewski-arena-dance-only-the-perverse-fantasy-can-still-save-usand an article in the Walker Reader here: https://walkerart.org/summer-reader/

Cheng Xiong is a local artist, teacher, and community leader. Xiong grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota and received his Bachelors of Art in Dance at the University of Minnesota. Though he began his journey as a street dancer, through his studies, he was able to broaden to different styles and professional skills. Xiong is also a Hmong dance artist/researcher who is among the first in Minnesota to fuse forms of Breaking, Contemporary, and acrobatic dance styles. He is currently a company member of Black Label Movement and have recently worked with local professional companies such as STRONGmovement, BRKFST Dance, and Minnesota Timberwolves's First Avenue Breakers.As a dancer, choreographer, and a 2022 McKnight Dancer Fellow, Xiong has presented many new works throughout his career; Saint Paul Conservatory Performing Arts's J-Term Projet: Dance Repertory Concert, Arena Dances presents CANDY BOX as a Happy Hour artists, Mixtape 6: Cypher Space, Minneosta Orchestra's annual Young People's Concert: “Sounds of the Harvest,” and Black Label Movement's Inaugural Mover's Make.Alongside his repertoire of performances, Xiong is also a Breakdance instructor and educator. Xiong is currently teaching at the University of Minnesota Theater and Dance Program and Macalester College. Description of the work:“Off the beaten path… a solitary act”explores the emotional landscape of solitude and the courage needed to choose the road less traveled. It may be a lonely road, but it is where you will find your truest self—away from the noise of the world—peace carved to reflect, redefine, and grow. You must embrace a journey that diverges from conventional routes, requiring a willingness to step into the unknown. It is about seeking unique experiences, following intuition, and finding new perspectives undefined by societal expectations. Completing this journey equates to discovering personal truths, challenging comfort zones, and forging a distinctive path that reflects one's true self.

Joe Chvala (Artistic Director/Flying Foot Forum) is the founder and artistic director of the highly-acclaimed percussive dance company, the Flying Foot Forum. In addition to the Flying Foot Forum, Chvala has directed, choreographed, and been commissioned to create new works for a variety of theater and dance companies including the Guthrie Theater, the Walker Art Center, the Ordway Music Theater, the Minnesota Opera, Chicago Shakespeare, Children's Theater Company, Arkansas  Repertory, Theater Mu, Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre, the History Theater, The Alpine Theater Project, Park Square Theatre, and The Boston Conservatory.  He has been the recipient of both Ivey and Sage awards for theater and dance as well as numerous “Best of the Year” honors from various US newspapers and periodicals and numerous choreographic and interdisciplinary awards, fellowships, and grants from such organizations as the National Endowment for the Arts, the Minnesota State Arts Board, and the McKnight Foundation. His recent film work as a director/writer has been featured in a number of European and American film festivals.Description of WorkFootfall—Choreographed by Joe Chvala, “Footfall” features a mixture of Flying Foot Forum's signature hybrid percussive dances with traditional clogging, folk music and dance to celebrate the passing of time, the ephemeral quality of life and the joys, struggles, strengths, longings, passions, and melancholy that are a part of it all. This piece will appear in its entirety in our upcoming concert May 8-18 at Park Square Theater. NOTE: The a cappella clogging duet “One Hundred Dead Dollars” was choreographed by founding company member, Clayton Schanilec.

Under the direction of Alexandra Bodnarchuk, Doma Dance Theater creates dance works for the stage and screen that explore the body as a tangible site of culture. Doma, the Carpatho-Rusyn word for “at home,” cultivates a sense of belonging, curiosity, and exuberant self-expression for its performers and audiences. Doma's cross-cultural approach creates powerful contemporary dance works that examine shared experiences of diaspora and displacement. Informed by Bodnarchuk's pan-Slavic cultural upbringing in Pittsburgh, PA, Doma's work incorporates cultural influences, circular spatial patterning, and intimate partnering. As the first Carpatho-Rusyn American choreographer to make contemporary work with a folk lens, Doma's works blaze a trail for Slavic representation in contemporary dance, demonstrating the enduring necessity of unearthing the cultural legacies each of us carry.Founded in 2024, Doma represents an evolution of Alexandra Bodnarchuk Dance Projects (ABDP), founded in 2017. Building upon Bodnarchuk's past focus on body identity and societal expectations of womanhood, Doma continues to unfold the embodied experience in an ongoing search for the elusive feeling of home.Doma'a inaugural season includes performances at Candy Box Dance Festival, and Thistle & Rose at Celtic Junction. For more information visit domadancetheater.org or follow them on Instagram @domadancetheater. Doma Dance Theater's new work for the 2025 Candy Box Dance Festival is set against an aural backdrop of Carpatho-Rusyn folk songs from the Šambron and Poloniny regions of Eastern Slovakia. Featuring dancers Alexandra Bodnarchuk, Non Edwards, Odessa Rain, and Yukina Sato accompanied by Mila Vocal Ensemble, the women weave in and around each other in syncopated harmony. 

NERVOUS THEATRE is a nomadic theatrical collective creating ensemble-driven productions. Their work celebrates and exploits the ‘liveness' of theatre for all its physical and communal possibilities. Founded by artistic director Connor Berkompas, NERVOUS THEATRE has been hailed as "Ambitious and Fabulous" by The San Diego Reader and recognized as "an electrifying company to keep a close eye on" by The Arts Business. Their eclectic body of work has been presented by arts organizations across the nation including Tinworks Art, Gloucester Stage Company, The Boston Conservatory, Westside Theater and Surel's Place.NERVOUS THEATRE will make their Minneapolis debut with the full-length work DANCING ANIMALS at The Southern Theater as part of their Performance Partnership Program in June of 2025.HH showing Friday, 4/24/25 5:30pmdance with me, baby is a celebration of communal movement and its transformative power. On this night, with this audience, what is the conversation that only we can have? In rediscovering each other, can we envision new ways of being together?There are four of us… and many more of you.Why are we all speaking at the same time?When did we start dancing?Where do we go from here?Nervous Theatre presents a work-in-process ahead of their evening-length premiere at The Southern Theater in June of 2025. dance with me, baby is created by artistic director Connor Berkompas in collaboration with Alexandra Bodnarchuk, Marcela Michelle, and Yukina Sato.

Dive into a world devoid of time that witnesses two people attempt to navigate their relationship while questioning their boundaries, perceptions of reality, and conflict resolution skills within the confined space of a growing cardboard set. Nieya Amezquita is a Minnesota-based artist currently working with Threads Dance Project, Rhythmically Speaking, Elayna Waxse Movement Projects and eMartin Dance while collaborating with independent artists like Kaitlyn Hawkins. She has also performed works with Concerto Dance, Yuki Tokuda, Off-Leash Area and Alexandra Bodnarchuk Dance Projects. Nieya earned a BFA in Dance from the University of Georgia. There she had the opportunity to perform nationally and internationally with founding company CADE:NCE before studying in Portugal with the Addo Platform. Most recently, Nieya has been a featured artist in the Blackness Is Arts festival produced by the Guthrie Theater, choreographed for Threads Dance Project and Alternative Motion Project, and launched her own dance company in 2023, Amez Dance.KAITLYN HAWKINS  (she/her) is a freelance dance artist and choreographer based in NYC who likes to research an endless list of questions with movement and conversation. She has performed with TU Dance, Shapiro & Smith, Honeyworks, Hatch Dance, Contempo Physical, Doma Dance, and Black Label Movement. She has self-presented work in Minneapolis, MN and Brooklyn, NY, and participated as a choreographer in the Movers Make showcase and the Candybox Dance Festival in Minnesota.

Yukina Sato is a Japanese dancer, choreographer, and filmmaker whose work explores the dynamic interplay of movement, identity, and culture. Her artistic practice delves into the liminal space of hybridity, capturing the unique experiences of living between two countries and navigating overlapping cultural landscapes. Yukina has collaborated with acclaimed performing artists and companies, including Abby Zbikowski, Crystal Perkins, Bebe Miller, and Diavolo – Architecture in Motion – among many others. As the co-founder of YY Dance+Media, she is passionate about creating innovative multimedia performances that merge dance, technology, and storytelling. Her recent work, Motion of Seeing, premiered at the Detroit Dance City Festival and earned the National Exchange Award in 2023, leading to performances at the RAD Festival in 2024. Yukina holds an MFA in Dance from The Ohio State University and a BFA in Dance Performance from the University of Central Oklahoma. Currently, she serves as an Assistant Professor of Dance at Minnesota State University Mankato. In this role, she shares her passion for movement, creativity, and choreography with students. 

Marge Maddux was born on December 28, 1944 in Cincinnati, Ohio.She graduated from Oak Hills High School in 1962 following a successfulstint as a baton twirler and majorette.She graduated from Denison University in Granville Ohio in 1966 with aBachelor of Arts degree.She graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 1968 with a Master ofArts degree, following her studies under Bessie Schoenberg.She taught dance at Macalester College in St. Paul Minnesota from1969 until 1972.Marge was a founding member of The Ethnic Dance Theatre in 1974,and remained with the company for 30 years as a performer, while alsoassisting in the production of performances and in running companyrehearsals.In 1972 she opened The Yarnery, a retail yarn store in St. Paul sellingsupplies for knitting and weaving.In 1973 Nadine Jette Sween hired Marge to teach folk dance at the Universityof Minnesota.Marge was the director of the dance program from 1998 until 2004She taught her last class in the Fall of 2007, before retiring as anassociate professor.Marge worked with architect Joan Soranno on the design andconstruction of a new building to house the dance program. TheBarbara Barker Center For Dance opened in 1999.She worked to have the dance program receive its initial accreditationwith the National Association of Schools of Dance in 1991.After retiring Marge moved to Ashland, Oregon with her family.

Jennifer Glaws is an artist who makes body-based work, who believes in elevating a deep-rooted felt experience for the audience, performer, and participant with the presentation of her work. She probes the physical psychology of SPACE and EFFORT, scrutinizing these elemental contemporary dance themes to recognize human and humane connection, time, push the proscenium, and inspire inquiry. Jennifer works as a choreographer, contemporary performance artist, educator, producer, and curator, serving as Artistic/Executive Director for Jagged Moves, Curator for RADFest Kalamazoo, MI, and Assistant Professor of Dance at Colorado Mesa University, Grand Junction. She specializes in the creation of multi-disciplinary danceworks and cross-disciplinary collaboration, and has been recognized nationally with commissions, residencies, and invitations for her work by Red Eye Theater (MN), Southern Theater (MN), Gustavus Adolphus College (MN), Hamline University (MN), DanceBARN (MN), Harvest Chicago Contemporary Dance Festival, Peck School of the Arts - University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Northeast Minneapolis Arts Association, Sans Limites Dance (NY), RADfest (MI), Cohesion Dance Project (MT), The Generating Room: Cowles Center (MN).

Nancy J. Duncan has had an eclectic career spanning over 50 years of experience in the performing arts as a dancer, educator, producing director, manager, and arts management consultant.Nancy's dance training started under Nevorah Adams in South Dakota and it was through Nevorah's hosting of a summer dance residency taught by Loyce Houlton and two of her dancers, Frances Machala and David Voss, that her passion for dancing fully ignited. Under the tutelage of Houlton and her beautiful, diverselyskilled dancers and many guest artists at the Contemporary Dance Playhouse in Minneapolis, later renamed Minnesota Dance Theater, Nancy developed her skills as a dance teacher and performer.Upon moving to New York City in 1981, Nancy began forming her own artistic vision and mission greatly inspired by Loyce Houlton's vision. Working in partnership with composer Scott Killian and dancer Jackie Goodrich, and in consultation with Lawrence Rhodes, esteemed dancer, teacher and Chair of the New York University Tisch School for the Arts Dance department, Nancy conceived and founded CoDanceCo (collaborative dance company).Nancy and her team established CoDanceCo as a production company devoted to nurturing the creative development of dance artists and providing audience access to outstanding dance artistry that reflected the creativity and eclecticism of contemporary dance. CoDanceCo was designed as a highly flexible organizational model that could adapt to the ever-changing world of dance creators, performers, collaborators, educators, presenters, and audiences.From 1982-1991 Duncan commissioned and presented works created by 28 choreographers, 14 composers, and 50 dancers. Choreographers commissioned over the years include Eiko & Koma, Ralph Lemon, Susan Marshall, Bebe Miller, Mark Morris, Charles Moulton, Ohad Naharin, Doug Varone, Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane, among others. Duncan's work through CoDanceCo garnered Duncan a 1991 New York Dance and Performance Award Citation (aka Bessie).Highlights from 1991-2003 include serving as the artistic director for London Contemporary Dance Theatre; producer of a four-week British dance festival in New York City, project management for Arts International, and Community Outreach Programs Director for Mikhail Baryshnikov's White Oak Dance Project production PastForward, touring both nationally and internationally.From 1996-2003, under the umbrella of CoDanceCo, Duncan managed to keep producing projects to support dance artists and their audiences through her membership in the New York State DanceForce. The projects were accomplished in partnership with NY state artists, presenters, and educators. In 2003 Duncanrelocated to Long Island and established a new home base for her work through CoDanceCo. During this time Duncan also served as a member of the Suffolk County Citizens Arts Advisory Board, became a founding member of the Patchogue Arts Council, served on the Board of the Patchogue Theater, among other opportunities.In 2006, Duncan was introduced to Pierre Dulaine's arts-in-education, social-emotional in-school residency program titled “Dancing Classrooms.” Working in partnership with Dulaine, Duncan secured a two-year grant from the Dana Foundation to have CoDanceCo become the licensed national network affiliate site on Long Island. Pierre and his staff trained Duncan and a team of teaching artists in the Dancing Classrooms syllabus and the company launched its first in-school residencies in the winter of 2008. Since the founding of DancingClassrooms on Long Island, CoDanceCo's teaching artists have touched the lives of over 30,000 youth, adults, educators and families with the transformative power of Dancing Classrooms. For youth and adults alike, the program creates meaningful social connections, inspires respect for diversity, and instills self-confidence all through the joy of social dance.

Susan Delattre was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She graduated fromBarnard College and earned an MFA in Dance from the University ofNorth Carolina at Greensboro. She continued in the academic worldteaching in the University of Minnesota's Dance Program. As a member ofthe Minnesota Independent Choreographer's Alliance, she choreographedand produced dance pieces, including a solo evening and collaborationswith other performers. Through the MN State Arts Board, Susan traveledthroughout the state doing Artist in the Schools residencies. With Heckand Delattre: Story Dance Theater, she performed in school assemblies. Shealso performed with At the Foot of the Mountain women's theater and theWomen's Performance Project. She co-authored two fables, The Woman WhoLost Her Heart and The Woman Who Found Her Voice. She has also self-publisheda collection of her poetry, Such Days as This.Susan currently lives in Minneapolis, working with hope for the healing of our planet from climate change.

Justin Leaf is a Minneapolis-based ballet teacher, choreographer, and performance artist whose multifaceted career spans over two decades. A graduate of The Juilliard School with a BFA in Dance Performance, Justin's training also includes The Kirov Academy, School of American Ballet, and Pacific Northwest Ballet School.As a dancer, Justin was a company member with James Sewell Ballet and Minnesota Dance Theatre, and has also performed works by Ernesta Corvino, John Kelly, Morgan Thorson, George Stamos, and others through independent engagements. Critics have described them as “a fascinating and beguiling dancer—so lanky, loose, and idiosyncratic that [their] fine-tuned ballet chops take you by surprise” (Deborah Jowitt, The Village Voice).In their extensive teaching career, Justin has worked with various schools and companies, including Ballet Hispánico, James Sewell Ballet, Minnesota Dance Theatre, Ballet Co.Laboratory, and Minnesota Ballet. Their teaching is influenced by their professional experiences and mentorship under master teachers Andra and Ernesta Corvino.As a choreographer, Justin has created works presented by organizations such as Minnesota Dance Theatre, James Sewell Ballet, and Minnesota Orchestra. Their performance work currently encompasses dance, theater, and vocal artistry. Since 2006, they have frequently performed as Mistress Ginger, a glittering cabaret persona. As Ginger, they authored Mistress Ginger Cooks!: Everyday Vegan Food for Everyone (2014).Justin is honored to have received awards such as the Zaraspe Prize for Outstanding Choreography, a Minnesota SAGE Award for Best Performance, a McKnight Fellowship for Dancers, and a Next Step Fund Grant.

Scott Killian has composed scores for Zvi Gotheiner (over 30 works), Shapiro & Smith Dance, Cherylyn Lavagnino, David Dorfman, Susan Marshall, Ralph Lemon, Bebe Miller, Alwin Nikolais and Murray Louis. His works have been performed with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, Limon Dance Company, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, PACT Dance (South Africa), et al. Venues include The Joyce Theater, Lincoln Center, New York City Center, New York Live Arts, Jacob's Pillow, The Annenberg Center and many regional venues. As a dance musician, he is a regular accompanist at NYC's Gibney 890 Studios and NYU Tisch School of the Arts. As a composer and sound designer for theater, Scott has created works for over 120 professional productions in NYC and at many regional theaters. NYC theatrical venues include Manhattan Theatre Club, The Public Theater, New York Theater Workshop, MCC, Red Bull Theatre, Primary Stages and Rattlestick Theatre. Regional theatres include George Street Playhouse (over 25 productions); Berkshire Theatre Group (Resident Composer--over 50 productions), Alley Theatre (Houston), Shakespeare Theatre (DC), Seattle Repertory Theatre, A.C.T. (San Francisco). Cleveland Playhouse, Shakespeare and Company, Cincinnati Playhouse, Huntington Theatre, Williamstown Theatre Festival.

Born in Chicago, Wendy began dancing with nuns who taught from ballet records.  Her vast experiences in dance crossed the country from UCLA to Colorado College to NYU and landed her in Minnesota where she taught at Carleton College and served as a Roster Artist for the Minnesota State Arts Board, teaching in hundreds of schools across the state. Always a fighter and an advocate for a better tomorrow, she served as Board member during the transition from the Minnesota Independent Choreographer's Alliance (MICA) to the Minnesota Dance Alliance (MDA). With a committee of K-12 and college educators, she created and presented the Dance/Theatre license to the MN Board of Children, Families and Learning; with Michael Engel she wrote a K-8 Scope and Sequence in Dance and Theatre for the Minneapolis Public Schools; and with her charter school colleagues at Community School of Excellence, she led the courageous conversations to vote in the first ever wall-to-wall MN Charter School Union in which she served as Union President.

Sarah McCullough (she/her) is a Minneapolis-based movement enthusiast, freelance performer, yoga practitioner/teacher, and educator in contemporary forms. Originally from Virginia, she attended James Madison University as a Madison Achievement Scholar, and earned her BA in Dance and Mathematics. As a student, she performed works by Doug Varone, Netta Yerushalmy, Christopher K. Morgan, Rubén Graciani, and others. Since joining Minneapolis' dance community in 2018, she has had the pleasure of performing in works choreographed by Alexandra Bodnarchuk, Berit Ahlgren, Carl Flink, Helen Hatch, Marisol Herling, Mathew Janczewski, Taja Will, and more. She has toured with Minneapolis based dance companies Black Label Movement and ARENA DANCES to the greater Minnesota area, Florida, and New York. She is a highly collaborative artist who is passionate about aliveness in performance, and seeks to perform works that center humanity, complexity, and play. She currently teaches contemporary classes at Zenon Dance School, Hothouse, and Minnesota Dance Theater. Sarah has offered classes at the Limón Twin Cities Intensive, ARENA DANCES' Instinct Intensive, The University of Winchester (UK), North Carolina State University, and several high school dance programs throughout the Twin Cities. She is also a 200-hour accredited yoga teacher and offers a holistic approach to mindful movement as a personal and artistic practice. 

Ruby Josephine Smith is a contemporary dance artist, choreographer, and founder of new company Ruby Josephine Dance Theater (RJDT). She is passionate about movement as a form of emotional expression, story-telling, and language. This passion was molded from having two artist parents, getting involved in both theater  and contemporary dance in her early years, and by her unconventional dance training, traveling around the world from the age of 20 to learn from a variety of artists at intensives and residencies. In 2014 she landed in Tangier, Morocco which became her home for the next 7 years, working with contemporary dance as an emerging art form in the city.  In Tangier, Ruby's choreography was commissioned and sponsored by the US Embassy of Morocco,  l'Institut Français, the American Language Center Network, and the American Legation. She also had opportunities to perform and work with international artists at festivals around Europe. Ruby returned to her hometown of Minneapolis, MN in 2020 and has since choreographed works for Collab Arts, Zenon Zone, Threads Dance Project, and more recently two full-length productions under her company's umbrella. She performs with Analog Dance Works and has appeared in work by Jennifer Mack and Jagged Moves. Ruby has been a teaching artist for over 10 years and currently teaches regular contemporary classes at Hothouse and WestMet Classical Training. She also offers artist residencies and dance program consultation to the American International School Network where she has taught in France, India and Vietnam. Throughout all of this work, Ruby believes strongly in the power of dance to tell stories, explore personal processes, and form strong human connections. 

Brenna Mosser (she/her) is a dance artist based in Minneapolis, MN. She seeks to illuminate the awe in her surroundings by sculpting falls, stumbles, and asymmetries gracefully. She spent two years in the Conservation Corps of Minnesota and Iowa, where she faced the reality of climate change and has since dedicated her work to dissect and digest this crisis with her community.She earned her bachelor's in dance performance at the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London, UK. She supplemented her degree at le Centre national de la danse Contemporaine in Angers, France where she spent two years learning intensively from world-renowned dance companies and their artists. There, she earned an L3 licence in dance performance and in arts management. Brenna founded founded Analog Dance Works in 2019, a dance company whose mission is to explore the intersection between dance and science through choreographic works and roundtable discussions. Alongside Analog, she currently dances for Threads Dance Project, Ruby Josephine Dance Theater, 43x94 Movement Research, and Zoë Koenig.

Elayna Waxse (she/they) is a St. Paul-based choreographer, dance educator, and performer who prioritizes emotional attunement, identity and risk taking in their work. They facilitate an environment of empathy, compassion and witnessing in which artists feel empowered to bring their full social and cultural identity to the work. Elayna has been commissioned by Minnesota Dance Theatre, University of Minnesota Dance Department (2022 Cowles Visiting Artist), Carleton College Dance Department, Threads Dance Project, St. Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists, and the University of Minnesota Opera Theater among others. She was a 2023 alternate selection for the Ann and Weston Hicks Choreography Fellowship at Jacob's Pillow, and a 2024 finalist for the Carmel Dance Festival Choreography Fellowship. In 2023, her work was selected for the National Gala Performance at the American College Dance Association's National Conference in Long Beach, CA. In 2024, she was invited to join the inaugural cohort of ChoreoTech: Immersive Dancemaking with AI and VR at The School at Jacob's Pillow.Professionally, Elayna has danced with Minnesota Dance Theatre, Colorado Ballet/Colorado Ballet Studio Company, Black Label Movement, BodyCartography Project, and with Cie. Ismael Ivo at ImPulsTanz Vienna International Dance Festival and in São Paulo, Brazil.She was a member of TU Dance from 2012 to 2019, performing works by Alvin Ailey, Dwight Rhoden, Jawole Willa Jo Zoller, Katrin Hall, Francesca Harper, Stephanie Batten-Bland, Gioconda Barbuto, and Gregory Dolbashian among others. They were part of the original creation team of Come Through, the collaboration between TU Dance and Grammy-award winning musical group Bon Iver. Through this collaboration Elayna performed at the Hollywood Bowl (LA, CA), the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (Washington, D.C.), and at Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival (Manchester, TN). Elayna is 2019 recipient of a McKnight Fellowship in Dance, through which they worked with choreographer Bobbi Jene Smith on an original solo. As a dance educator, they have taught ballet and contemporary dance at the University of Minnesota, Minnesota Dance Theatre, TU Dance, and Macalester College. In 2024, they served as Interim Artistic Director for Minnesota Dance Theatre & School and they are currently the Dayton Hudson Visiting Artist/Teacher at Carleton College.

Javan Mngrezzo(he/him) is a dance creator, instructor, and performer – in that order. He relocated to Minnesota in 2021 by way of Portland, OR. Oregon was his second home state, after CA, where he graduated from Western Oregon University in three years, magna cum laude, with a Bachelor of Science in Dance and Sociology. As a creator: past credits include AMEZ Dance, James Sewell Ballet, and Minnesota Dance Theater – to name a few. As an instructor: currently teaching at Out on a Limb, and has previously taught at studios such as Lundstrum and HotHouse – to name a few. As a performer: past credits include AMEZ Dance, Rhythmically Speaking, ARENA Dances, and James Sewell Ballet – to name a few. He is presently investigating the convergence of dance and other mediums that will slowly find a home within his new creative art hub ZzoZzo.mn. 

Lily Conforti is a performer, choreographer, and dance teacher from the Twin Cities. She graduated from the University of Minnesota with degrees in dance and physiology in May 2021. She is interested in articulation of movement with music, and creating multimedia dance works that are new and exciting for audience members. Lily is the founder and choreographer for Corpus Dance Works. She started the group in 2019. They have performed in the MN, Indy, and Calgary Fringe Festivals, Candy Box Dance Festival, Inbox at Artbox, DanceBarn's Vol III CollabArts, and in other local festivals. The group creates under a collective goal of combining dance and other artistic genres such as Dance and Theater in their most recent hour long show 'All the Hullabaloo'. Lily looks to push storytelling, whimsy, and artistry to the forefront of her work and also to remind audiences that art can be serious while also being a silly, fun time. Along with her own dance choreographies, Lily has performed in work by Kjara Wurst, Gallim Dance, Honey Works Dance, Black Label Movement, and Alternative Motion Project. She will be performing with Threads Dance Project this coming November 2024!

Nieya Amezquita is a Minnesota-based professional dancer working with Threads Dance Project and Rhythmically Speaking. She has also performed works with Concerto Dance, Alexandra Bodnarchuk Dance Projects and many others. Nieya earned a BFA in Dance from the University of Georgia. There she had the opportunity to perform nationally and internationally with founding company CADE:NCE before studying in Portugal with the Addo Platform. Most recently, Nieya choreographed for Threads Dance Project and Alternative Motion Project, was a Happy Hour Artist in the CandyBox Dance Festival hosted by Arena, and launched her own dance company, Amez Dance. 

Alexandra Bodnarchuk is a Carpatho-Rusyn American choreographer and cultural activist based in Minneapolis, MN. As the Artistic Director and choreographer for Doma Dance Theater, Bodnarchuk creates original works for the stage and screen that draw together her ethnic heritage with contemporary movement practices. Centering the body as a tangible site of culture, Bodnarchuk explores questions of self-expression, community, dispossession, and cross-cultural identity through works that range from solo pieces to ensemble works.Bodnarchuk is a 2021 Ann & Weston Hicks Choreography Fellow at Jacob's Pillow and a 2022 & 2020 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow Finalist (Jerome Foundation). Her second evening-length work, Rock, Paper, Scissors, was presented by The Southern Theater in March 2023.In 2024 she released her second dance film Mamko Moja L'uba, which is named for a folk song popularized by Carpatho-Rusyn singer Maria Mačoskova, and featured costumes inspired by traditional clothing from the Zemplín region in Eastern Slovakia. She also completed a commission for The Museum of Russian Art, responding to Serbian sculptor Zoran Mojsilov's surrealist exhibition, The Dry Neck of the Pig. She is currently working on two commissions to premiere in Spring/Summer 2025, including being a Featured Artists in Arena Dance's 2025Candy Box Dance Festival.Bodnarchuk is the daughter of first- and third-generation immigrants. She was raised in Pittsburgh, PA, where she studied European folk traditions, including classical ballet and Slavic and Balkan folk dance. Southwestern PA, which hosts an active community of Eastern European folk organizations, has the largest concentration of Carpatho-Rusyns in the United States. As a member of the North Hills Junior Tamburitzans, Bodnarchuk was taught by the renowned Željko Jergan with a primary focus on Croatian dances. She also performed with the now-shuttered Slavjane Folk Ensemble, the sole Carpatho-Rusyn children's dance ensemble in the United States. Under the direction of Jack Poloka she toured Slovakia, Poland, and Ukraine, exploring the diasporic homeland and cultural landscape of the Carpatho-Rusyns.Bodnarchuk graduated from Bodiography Contemporary Ballet's College Preparatory Program and then earned a BFA in Dance Performance and Choreography and BA in French from Ohio University (OU). During college, she spent a semester in Avignon, France, training at the Conservatoire d'Avignon under Cyrille de la Barre. She also studied Ghanaian dance and drumming under the direction of Paschal Yao Younge and Zelma Badu-Younge and was amember of their group Azaguno African Dance Ensemble.Embracing her role as a cultural activist, Bodnarchuk has continued to deepen her study of and connection to Carpatho-Rusyn cultural traditions by visiting her ethnic homeland and learning the Rusyn language. By amplifying her ethnic heritage and probing the connections among the Carpatho-Rusyn experience and diasporic communities around the world, Bodnarchuk offers a potent invitation to rediscover the unrecognized histories embedded in each of us.

Cheng Xiong is a local Hmong dance artist, choreographer, teacher, and community leader. Xiong was born in a refugee camp in Thailand, sponsored by family in the United States, and moved to St. Paul, Minnesota. Xiong started picking up Hip Hop dance, particularly Break(dance)ing, through family and friends. With his journey as a street dancer, he continued his studies in dance at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities and was able to broaden to different styles and professional skills. Xiong became the first in his family to receive a Bachelor of Arts. He is currently a company member of Black Label Movement. He recently worked with local professional companies such STRONGmovement, BRKFST Dance, and Minnesota Timberwolves's First Avenue Breakers. He is also a Breakdance instructor and educator, teaching at Cypher Side Dance School and the University of Minnesota Dance Program. Xiong is also a Hmong dance artist/researcher who is among the first in Minnesota to fuse forms of Breaking, Contemporary, and acrobatic dance styles. His integrated movement practice consists of floorwork, high physicality transitions, and rigorous dynamic movements that thrive on integration and cross-training. Developing a new personal style that pushes athletic skills to their highest and at the same time challenges the creative process by drawing from his background, allowing movements forming together in unique ways. His overarching aim is to continue to use the body as a medium for communication.Some highlights of his work were in 2018, when Xiong participated in the “I'm From…Vol. 2” show at the Southern Theater, where he debuted his solo in collaboration with Tou Saiko Lee, called “Being Hmong, Being Free.” That same year, Xiong was one of the choreographers to present work for Saint Paul Conservatory Performing Arts' J-Term Project: Dance Repertory Concert, where he debuted his new work “Locomote” in The O'shaughnessy theater at St. Catherine University.  In 2022, Xiong was awarded as one of the McKnight Dancer Fellows. The following year, Xiong debuted his new work “Penumbra” at the Southern Theater, for Arena Dances presents CANDY BOX as one of the Happy Hour artists. Right after that, he also debuted his new work called “Breaking Breaking” for the Mixtape Collective show, Mixtape 6: Cypher Space, that was held at the Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts. Later in fall of 2023, the Minneosta Orchestra commissioned Xiong to create a duet called, “Stories of the Harvest,” with composer Jocelyn Hagen's excerpt of “Shoua and the Northern Lights Dragon,” for their annual Young People's Concert: Sounds of the Harvest. In 2024, Xiong presented his new work “Polarity” at the Barbara Barker Center for Dance for Black Label Movement's Inaugural Mover's Make series.Alongside his repertoire of performances, Xiong is a Breakdance instructor and educator. He has taught at after-school programs such as Washington Technology Magnet Middle, Hazel Park Preparatory Academy, and Ramsey Middle through the East Side Arts Council. At present, Xiong is currently teaching at the University of Minnesota Minnesota Theater and Dance Program and Cypher Side Dance School.

Born and raised in Minneapolis Minnesota, Jake is a teacher and performing artist in the Twin Cities. Having danced since the age of three, and being trained in tap dance, ballroom dance, jazz dance, modern dance, as well as having an interest in physical therapy and yoga, Jake graduated from St. Olaf College with a BFA in Dance and Exercise Science.Alongside being a company member of Black Label Movement, Ruby Josephine Dance Theatre, and Rhythmically Speaking, Jake has worked with or continues to work with Arena Dances, Contempo Physical Dance, Concerto Dance, Buckets and Taps, Mixtape, Threads Dance Project, Flying Foot Forum, Katha Dance Theatre, Eau Claire Dance, STRONGmovement, and has performed in Stephan Koplowitz's Northfield Experience. Jake has also danced in Au, a Live at the Shed work created by Hatch Dance and Honey Works.Jake currently teaches at Prairie School of Dance as well as Ballare Teatro Performing Arts Center. 

Julie Kerr-Berry retired in 2023 after 35 years at Minnesota StateUniversity, Mankato (MSUM). In 2020, she became chair of theDepartment of Theatre & Dance. Throughout her tenure, she helped tobuild multiple degrees in Dance. Julie is Editor Emerita of the Journal ofDance Education. Her scholarly publications focus on the intersections ofdance, race, and history specific to whiteness. Recently she was namedof Minnesota Dance Educator of the Year and was the recipient ofa Distinguished Faculty Scholar Award at MSUM (2019). From the NationalDance Education Organization, she received a Top Paper Citation (2011),an Outstanding Leadership Award (2012), Executive Director's Award (2020),and Presidential Award for dedication to the National Dance EducationOrganization's, Justice, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Project/JDEI Project(2022). The American College Dance Association (ACDA) recognized hercreative research. War Story was the 2nd Alternate for ACDA's 2014 NationalDance Festival at the Kennedy Center. Julie taught in a federal prison forwomen which she hopes to continue. As a Fulbright Scholar in Indonesia,she became an advocate of international dance education, which latermotivated her travels to Nigeria, Australia, New Zealand, Cuba, andFrance. In France, Julie co-led a study abroad course to Paris and Dijon onseveral occasions where students danced, performed, traversed bothcities, and the French countryside. She is an avid practitioner of Vinyasayoga. Currently, she is writing a book that is a cultural critique of Americandance history through the lens of whiteness. Julie earned her EdD andMEd in Dance from Temple University in Philadelphia, PA.

Steve Paul received his BA in English from the University of Iowa in 1983, then immediately moved to Minneapolis.In 1984 he joined Red Eye Collaboration, where he was the resident “all things tech” until 1989.In 1989 he joined the Minnesota Dance Alliance, taking over the “Dance Production Clearinghouse”, building and running of the Studio 6A performance space until 1997. During those years he was privileged to join and work with the extraordinary community of performing artists that flourished in that amazing time and place.While there, he also began to use early CADD, 3D, and video software for stage design.On leaving the Dance Alliance, he has worked as a Designer, Production and Stage Manager,Video Producer and Editor, 3D visualization and animation expert, educator, and artist.In 2002, he and Paula Mann consummated their artistic relationship with the formation of Time Track Productions. As co-Artistic Directors of Time Track, he and Paula have created and produced work that is dedicated to exploring the relationship between humanity and its projections.In 2012 he received his MFA in Interactive Media Design from the University of Minnesota.In 2014 he took on the direction of the Visualization Team for AECOM in the Americas, creating 3D renderings, animations, video, web, and Virtual Reality for the global Architecture, Engineering, and Construction firm.

Ray Terrill | Dance Group has been performing in and around the Twin Cities since Ray relocated in 1994.Originally from the Pacific Northwest, he has extensive experience as performer, choreographer, teacher, presenter and arts program administrator.He started his professional modern dance career as a member of Martha Graham-based Repertory Dancers Northwest in Seattle Washington until relocating to Portland Oregon to work with the Mary Wigman-based modern dance company Oregon Dance Consort. In Portland, he eventually became co-artistic director of the company where he choreographed numerous original works, taught extensively and produced the contemporary dance season Pulse/Impulse for five consecutive years. He also served as guest artist with many well known regional dance companies and choreographed original dances for regional producing organizations.While in Portland, Ray collaborated with other dance professionals to found the statewide Dance Coalition of Oregon, a dance service organization, for which he served as Executive Director from 1991-1994.After relocating to the Twin Cities, Ray spent five seasons as a member of the Christopher Watson Dance Company while establishing the Ray Terrill Dance Group.Proficient in classical modern dance technique he has evolved a choreographic aesthetic described by critics as uniquely spiritual and lyrical on one hand while irreverent and quirky on the other. Aesthetically, Ray is inspired by wide-ranging music styles and is attracted to exploring provocative subject matter and complex emotion. He works hard to mine his material to expose the universal human experience. His more recent work has incorporated video, animation, and text as a backdrop to extend his choreographic ideas.In the Twin Cities, Ray has served as Board President for the Christopher Watson Dance Company, board member for Off-Leash Area, and advisor to the Walker Art Center's Tour Guide Council. Ray is also the sole producer of the annual Dances at the Lake Festival, a free open to the public performance, presented at the Lake Harriet Rose Garden in Minneapolis.Recently retired from his day job, Ray enjoyed a parallel career in the role of executive producer/management consultant to develop media-rich interactive communications and distance learning solutions for top 100 globalcorporations.Numerous government, foundation and corporate arts funding agencies have generously supported his choreography over the years and his dances have been presented in many venues including Seattle's On the Boards, Portland Center for the Performing Arts, Portland Art Museum, International Firehouse Cultural Center,Artquake, Festival of Physical Comedy, Walker Art Center, Weisman Art Museum, Lakeville Performing Arts, Art on the Edge, and Dances at the Lake Festivals. Over the years, Ray has taken advantage of the Fringe Festival performing circuit and has presented his dances at many including Minnesota, Chicago, Providence, Tucson, Salt Lake City and Denver.

Rebecca Frost, CMT, MSMT, MFA  (she / her) After her career as a modern dancer, she's moved into life as a multi-disciplinary artist, writer, somatic therapist, educator and activist.Rebecca earned a BA in Theater and an MFA in Writing and is certified in a number of modalities. As an adjunct faculty member, Rebecca taught Body-Mind Centering in the University of Minnesota Dance and Theater Department. She  created the course, Writing and Emotional Currency at The Loft Literary Center, taught experiential anatomy to UMN Medical students and at the Mpls Yoga Center, and body-sourced writing at Shakopee Women's Prison's recovery program for inmates. She recently served on the Board of Directors of the International Somatic Movement Education & Therapy Association (ISMETA), serving on the Government Relations, Research and Publication, and Equity, Justice and Accessibility committees. Through ISMETA, Rebecca is registered as a Master Somatic Movement Therapist. Her poetry and fiction have been published in journals and anthologies. Her MFA thesis was a novel, and she is intermittently at work on a creative nonfiction manuscript. She co-founded the popular "Dancers Who Write" reading series (with Linda Shapiro), won the Verve Spoken Word grant, and co-created The Women's Performance Project (convened by Diane Elliot) which received two McKnight Fellowships in Choreography. The groundbreaking work of The Women's Performance Project is described in a textbook, Dancing Female, lives and issues of women in contemporary dance in a chapter entitled Fire and Ice: Female Archetypes in American Modern Dance (pg. 117), published by Harwood Academic through Swarthmore College, editors Sharon E. Friedler and S. B. Glazer. A few of the performance projects Rebecca has contributed creatively to in the past decade include: Angry Black Woman and Well Intentioned White Girl (at Intermedia Arts and touring), a hilarious and necessary play by Amoke Kubat; The Revolution Will Not Be Culturally Competent (for the National Evaluator's Conference, and in collaboration with Pangea Theater), conceived and directed by Vidhya Shanker; and in residence as the writer for Waterlines (at the Gremlin Theater) by Summer Hills-Bonczyk, a ritual performance piece with 3,000 pounds of clay on stage which transformed through the evening, culminating a group intensive week of yoga-informed healing.Rebecca helps people become the best version of themselves. She is is an advocate for all things related to human development, consciousness, and how we express it. As a Somatic Therapist, her passion lies in helping each person take his/her/their next step, providing support for that exhilarating reach beyond one's own edge. In her private practice she works with you to assist in identifying and moving through your personal growing edges, to enhance performance of all kinds, to overcome fears, to heal. She is particularly skilled at working with dancers and other performers, including rehab from injuries, moving through trauma, expanding your range, embodying your whole self in all the settings. Rebecca is one of half a dozen certified teachers of LearningMethods / Anatomy of Wholeness in North America (created by David Gorman) which brings sharp focus to human structure, function and use, and how we bring our awareness to any given problem!Rebecca has provided Circle Keeping to Urban League High School, taught mediators at the Mpls Conflict Resolution Center and University of MN Law School, served on Restorative Justice panels for the prison diversion program of Hennepin County, and been hired to facilitate conflict in a variety of settings. Rebecca prioritizes racial justice and LGBTQIA liberation in the work she chooses, works with humans of all ages (pre-birth to elders), and welcomes everyone. Find out more: www.embodiedarts.com

Erika Thorne has been a progressive activist, writer, facilitator and cultural worker since 1974. She focuses on cross-race coalition-building, anti-racism work with other whites, and diversity work. Erika has worked with environmental and media justice groups, undocumented immigrants, Hmong organizations, domestic violence activists, housing projects residents, the national education department of a large US union, and a full range of non-profits, organizers and rabble-rousers. In 2012, she collaborated with local training organizations to co-facilitate four workshops for 98 Burmese nonviolent activists in northern Thailand. She trains multi-racial groups of trainers in the UK through Campaign Bootcamp, and in northern Europe with Vredesactie.  Erika is on the core organizing team of SURJ-MN (a white co-conspirator group.) She also loves to facilitate training of trainers, hate-crimes response, conflict waging, ethical grassroots fundraising, and meetings – especially real sticky ones! Erika was the Managing Director of MN Friends for a Nonviolent World for nearly three years, and coordinated the Alternatives to Violence Project-MN, offering intensive workshops in prisons and jails, for five years.  As a former dancer for social change, she brings joyful physicality to her facilitation.

Melanie Lien PalmCurrently: Body Wisdom LLC as owner, practitioner, instructor, presenter, perpetual student (I would LOVE to offer a 6 hour class of BodyTalk Access and/or a 1.5 hour class of EmotionalResolution for DANCERS! I'd be combining my love of dance with my love of energy medicine. BodyTalk is very helpful in operating at peak performance, preventing and recovering more quickly from injuries, and reconnecting lines of communication within your body. EmRes is very helpful in resolving emotional upset within 60 seconds. Contact me if you're interested in coordinating a class for a group either in-person or on Zoom.) www.BodyWisdomMelaniePalm.comCurrent certificates: Advanced BodyTalk and PaRama Practitioner, BodyTalk Access and MindScape Instructor, HelioSol Practitioner, Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy and International Yoga Therapist, Emotional Resolution Practitioner and Instructor, ElectroDermal Stress Analysis, Holistic Health PractitionerHomeschool: Founded, owned, administered and taught in Sunrise School serving infant through 2 nd grade, combining Montessori, Waldorf, Peacemaking and Creative Arts ~ 5 years Homeschooled our children and other's children ~ 10 yearsPresented at several homeschool workshops and wrote articles for international magazines Dance Performance: Pina Bausch Tanztheater Wuppertal ~6+ years in ‘80's touring in 11 countries, performing in 13 pieces, involved in creation of 3 piecesWild Space, U Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Minnesota Dance Theater, Black Hills Dance Theater, U of Utah, Creighton U, Omaha Opera Ballet, Academy of Dance, amongst othersTeaching and Choreographing: Various Universities ~ 7 yearsUniversity of Wisconsin Milwaukee ~ 2 years full timeGuest residencies at Creighton U, South Dakota State, North Carolina – Greensboro, New York U Tisch School of the Arts, U of Montana, Vassar, Northwestern, amongst othersPublic School residencies through NY and SD Artist-In-Schools K-12 ~ 15 yearsVarious dance schools and companies ~ 15 years including Johanna Meier's Opera workshops, Wild Space Dance Co WI, CoDanceCo NY, Dance Masters of WI, Montana Dance Arts, MidAmerica Dance Network, MN Dance Alliance, Dahl Fine Arts SD, “I Have a Dream” Program for Underprivileged Children NY, Lind Dance, Abbot Hospital for Emotionally Disturbed Children, Young Audiences MDT, SD School for Visually Impaired, amongst othersNumerous Panels and Adjudication, Recipient of GrantsInterests: People, nature, languages, joy, inspiration, gratitude

jess pretty is an Assistant Professor of Dance at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities and the current artistic director of AUNTS; a punk/DIY performance series that hosts events/festivals/shows to highlight the works of experimental dance makers in NYC. she has shown her work at La Mama Experimental Theater Club (2017 La Mama Moves Festival), New York Live Arts (as a 2016/17 Fresh Tracks artist), CATCH!, Gibney Dance Center, Brooklyn Studios for Dance, the CURRENT SESSIONS, panoply performing arts space, Green Street Studios, three ACDA conferences, and the Chocolate Factory Theatre. pretty has been an artist in residence at Kent State (2017), the Chocolate Factory Theatre, and the Center for Performance Research (2019-2020) and was also a 2020 member of the Queer Art Fellowship. pretty has collaborated and been a part of the works of: Will Rawls, Claudia Rankine, Kevin Beasley, Okwui Okpokwasili, Peter Born, Catherine Gallasso, David Thomson, Katie Workum, Niall Jones, Jennifer Monson, Cynthia Oliver, Leslie Cuyjet and Dianne McIntyre. call and response is a methodology for building connection and community; a celebration and appreciation for black life; an archival tool; and lens for embodiment. this work is personal and archival; calling on me to turn towards my own story, lineage and memory as the site of choreographic creation. in looking at myself, i aim to build a black queer archive to provide proof of life (instead of the constant images of black death we experience) for future generations. how do we come together? how do we see each other? how do we care for each other? how do we make space for pleasure, joy, ease and non-urgency? how do we 'get free' using the body as the site for radical transformation? taking place somewhere between an improvised self portrait and the middle of the dance floor, call and response directs our attention inward to the deep histories our bodies hold. calling us to say ‘yes' to "the encounter”, to vulnerability, to the collective, to the moving body, to change and to transformation.

Tristan Koepke (he/him) is a dancer, choreographer, and educator based in Portland, ME. He holds an MFA in Dance from the University of Maryland, College Park, and is currently Assistant Professor at Bates College and Associate Director of the Young Dancers Intensive at the Bates Dance Festival.Benny Olk (he/him) is a performing artist based in Minneapolis with an interest in contemporizing and contextualizing American modern and post-modern dance. As a member of Lucinda Childs Dance Company, he performed reconstructions of pieces such as Dance and Available Light. He performed in reconstructions of works by Merce Cunningham, and has premiered works by Moriah Evans and Anthea Hamilton. He is part of the Isolated Acts 2024 cohort at Red Eye Theater in Minneapolis. Benny holds a BFA in Dance from NYU and an MA in New Performative Practices from Stockholm University of the Arts.There's More Than One Bed is the second collaboration between Tristan Koepke and Benny Olk. Inspired by the creative and amorous relationship between Merce Cunningham and John Cage, Instagram thirst traps, speculative masculinities, and romance novel tropes, Koepke, Olk, and their collaborators interrogate what devotion and commitment to love, longing, and process can look like when you make room for more than two.

Paula Mann has been creating dances for 44 years and is a graduate of New York University. She was full time faculty at the University of Minnesota Department of Theater and Dance from 1993-2013. She is co-artistic director of Time Track Productions.APRIL 25-27, 2024 CBDF Featured Artist Work:NothingA trio: performed by myself, Leila Awadallah and Roxane Wallace. We question and  interrogate our understandings of our realities through movement. Building a focused movement vocabulary since November 2022, we are intent on shifting the structure of the movement and its qualities, hoping to convey that assumed constructs of our perceptions might not be truth. Imagery projected onto our bodies at the end of this section (part one), will contrast speed, timing and content. The meaning of those images and their relationship between the movement and the piece will amplify and articulate our physical vocabulary. Our movement/physical vocabularies will reflect our formative perspectives and perceptions -- the realities we grew into. Ranging from black and white broadcast for the oldest of us, to online mobile devices for the youngest, the streams of our understanding begin here. Sound score by Tarek AbdelqaderThis is part (one) of the trilogy and will be performed at The Candy Box Festival in April 2024 at The Southern Theater in Minneapolis. Everything and Nothing is a three-part series of dance performances, each 25 minutes in length, that will be performed over a two-year period in venues throughout Minneapolis/St Paul Minnesota. In 2026, all three parts will be performed together as an evening-length work.

For over forty-five years I was a movement educator, dancer and choreographer devoted to the exploration of the expression of the mind through the body. I graduated from the Juilliard School in 1971 and my first professional job was working in dance pioneer Anna Sokolow's Players' Projects. I continued to dance and perform professionally until 1995. My creative work as a choreographer and dancer always focused on how movement could fully express the states and conditions of the mind and heart. The objectification of movement has never been my interest; rather my concerns were always about excavating and exposing the roots of the subjectiveexperience through my work. As a director of two dance companies and an independentchoreographer I received numerous grants from private foundations, the states of Indiana and Minnesota and a National Endowment for the Arts Choreography Fellowship. I was a dance teacher throughout my dance career and taught all over the United States and Canada. I was on the faculty at the University of Minnesota from 1980 –1988 and then again from 1996 through 2019.In 1990 I began my transition from dancer, choreographer and dance teacher to body-worker and movement educator. I graduated from the School for Body-Mind Centering ® in 1994 and became a Certified Practitioner and Registered Somatic Movement Therapist and Educator. As a bodyworker and movement educator I help individuals discover and use the body's intelligence as they journey towards health and balance. My practice served women and men who wanted to find fuller physical presence, compassion for themselves and freedom from movement or behavioral patterns that are recapitulations of past trauma. Although much of my practice concerned psychotherapeutic application, I also worked with individuals (lots of dancers)recovering from physical injury, surgery or living with chronic pain. A small but important part of my practice included children who had developmental challenges.An important dimension of my work in the world was and is my ongoing practice in Buddhist mindfulness meditation. I integrated the methodology of mindfulness both in my private practice and in my coursework at the University. Teaching clients and students how to clarify the direct experience of mental activity and body sensations through awareness lead to a much fuller embodied presence in the here and now, whether that was dancing, performing or just living your life.I began teaching Body-Mind Centering at the University of Minnesota in 1996 first at the introductory level and advanced levels. These courses included an Introduction to Body-Mind Centering, graduate level courses covering a five-semester series, (the graduate level courses in Body-Mind Centering were discontinued in 2009 due to draconian budget cuts that affected the entire University) and The Articulate Body, a required course for Dance Majors enrolled in the BFA program.In 2018 I retired from private practice and then in 2019 I taught my last class at the UM, mostly due to hearing loss and a reluctance to do so much driving. I have lived in the country north of Elk River for over twenty-five years, am an avid gardener with a large vegetable patch, perennial gardens and borders, growing food and flowers. I have three children, nine grandchildren and much beauty in my life for which I am deeply grateful.

Joe Chvala has created over 30 original works for the stage that have toured from New York to Paris and from Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival to Litle Falls, MN. He is the founder and artistic director of the highly acclaimed percussive dance company, Flying Foot Forum. Articles and reviews of his work have appeared in national and international magazines and newspapers including the New York Times, La Monde, the Chicago Tribune, Dance Magazine, and the Village Voice. The range of his work has been described as "somewhere between Sammy Davis, Jr. and Samuel Becket" and has earned such accolades as "Fred Astaire on acid" and "the Agnes DeMille of the tap." Chvala has also choreographed, directed, and/or been commissioned to create new work for a variety of venues including the Walker Art Center, The Ordway Center, the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, The Guthrie Theater, the Minnesota Opera, Arkansas Repertory Theatre, The Children's Theatre Company (to name a few). He has received Ivey and Minnesota SAGE Awards for theater and dance, as well as numerous other awards, fellowships, and grants from organizations including the National Endowment for the Arts, Minnesota State Arts Board, Target, and McKnight Foundation. Chvala also choreographs and directs dance for films. His first short film, COOKAPHONY, has been chosen as an official selection at 14 film festivals, winning four awards at various festivals including Paris Short Film Festival, Sedona International Film Festival, Vasteras International Film Festival (Sweden) and the Minneapolis/St. Paul Internatonal Film Festval.

Swan Song Studies marks Zhauna's 6th full evening length production.Previous productions: The Dream Channel- Episodes 1 & 2 at The Ritz Theater, Episode 3 (in 3D) at Open Eye Figure Theatre, Her Hysterical Nostalgia (Open Eye Figure Theatre) and Beauty and the Beast (Minneapolis Fringe- Best Dance Production-Audience Choice Award).In New York Zhauna was featured in over 500 shows spanning 3 years with the award winning off-broadway immersive productions Sleep No More- Punchdrunk and Then She Fell- Third Rail Projects. She was an original member of Ballet of the Dolls for 25 years and Associate Artistic Director for 8 years, appearing in over 100 original productions. 

Kathryn (Thern) Anderson started her dance training at the U of M in 1968 with Margret Dietz, Heidi Hauser and Judith Mirus.  In 1971 she joined Margret's Company, Choreogram ,and danced there until 1976.  She then moved to Port Townsend, WA to work with Meg Robson, then to Portland Oregon to dance with Spira, and started Oregon Dance Consort with other dancers from the Wigman tradition. She was in New York from 1980 to 1987, studying at the Erick Hawkins studio, Floor Barre with Zena Rommet, Bartenieff Fundamentals, Anatomy and Kinesiology, Ideokinesis at NYU, Subtle Self with Judith Blackstone and Klein technique with Barbara Mahler.In Washington D.C. from 1987until  1993 she taught through Liz Lerman's Dnce Exchange, working with senior adults, psychiatric outpatients and hospitalized children.  In addition, she taught many children's Creative Movement classes at Jane Bittner Dnce Studio in Olbey MD.Back to Minnesota since 1993,  she has performed with Sharon Varosh, Maureen Koelsch, a children;s show with Linda Aus,”Seca” by Marciano Silva dos Santos, “Orphans” with Off leash Area, Pam Gleason,, “Invisible” with Paula Mann and as a guest artist with Christopher Watson Dance  Co.In the Twin Cities, she has taught at Zenon, TU Dance, “Dancing your Story” with Mary Waster through TU Dance and Aroha Philanthropies, Patrick's Cabaret and currently teaches Modern Dance at Tapestry.

When Cathy was 15, she fell in love with dance and mime while studying at the Children's Theater School with Myron Johnson and Wendy Lehr. She went on to dance with Zoe Sealy's Minnesota Jazz Dance Company where she met aspiring choreographer Ken Delap. As an original member of Ken Delap's Ozone Dance Company, Cathy performed across the Midwest and in New York City at the American Theater Laboratory.Other performance highlights include playing the lead in Kenneth Robbins' production, “Accidently Exalted” at St. Paul's Landmark Center, numerous productions at Chanhassen Dinner Theaters, Minnesota Opera, Kentucky Opera, and Minnesota Orchestra's Summer Pops Concerts, and live business theater events. Choreography credits include Chanhassen Dinner Theater, Minnesota Opera, Theatre Exchange, History Theater, Skylark Opera, Target Corporation, as well as colleges and high schools.As a mime, Cathy was an artist in residence through the Minnesota State Arts Board's Artists-in-Education Program, co-authored “The Mime Alphabet Book” with her sister, Nina, and performed as a Yoplait mime in New York and New Jersey.Since 1996, she's been working as a marketing writer for Twin Cities-based creative agencies and corporate clients. She still enjoys performing but now as a storyteller at The Moth, Minnesota Fringe Festival, Patrick's Cabaret, TEDx, Story Club, and Island of Discarded Women podcast.

Maria Genné is a dancer, choreographer and educator, recognized as a pioneering leader in the intergenerational interactive participatory performing arts, and arts and health fields. Her national award winning work to create interactive dance, music and story programs for intergenerational participants is designed to tap into the artistry and creativity of older adults and invite them to be central collaborators in the artistic process of dance, music and storytelling. It models a new and vital role in society for the community based professional performing artist, and new possibilities of intergenerational community enjoyment and understanding. Her 65+ choreography works are recognized for their ability to highlight the beauty of human experience through movement and story.In 2001, Maria developed The Dancing Heart™, a nationally recognized, evidence-based program which engages older adults of all abilities in weekly, interactive arts participation and health education. It was featured in the 2012 PBS documentary, Arts & the Mind, and is recognized as a model arts involvement program by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the National Center for Creative Aging (NCCA), and winner of awards for program innovation by the American Public Health Association, American Society on Aging, and others.

Rita Mustaphi is choreographer, dancer, educator and a disciple of the living legendPandit Birju Maharaj in Kathak style of Indian classical dance. She is known for hervisionary approach and innovations in dance, her multi-disciplinary productionsincorporating spoken word, live and commissioned music, and the utilization ofproduction elements. She is Founder and Artistic Director of Katha Dance Theatre (est.1987). Under her vision and leadership, the company has become renowned for itsdynamic productions, distinctive movement style and technical virtuosity. Her work,intelligently crafted storytelling, is recognized as being profoundly moving andeffortlessly intimate.Ms. Mustaphi is a recipient of three McKnight Fellowships (1998, 1992, 1988) forchoreography, and recently received the forth McKnight Fellowship for Choreography(2023). She received a Leadership award from the Council of Asian PacificMinnesotans, a Lifetime Achievement award from the India Association of Minnesotaand an Education award from the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts in thecategory of Excellence in Vision.With a career and a commitment to Kathak dance spanning 35+ years, over 500performances, and 50+ original choreographic works, she still revels in the process ofdirecting bodies in space, creating movement on her own body and exploring what“moves” an audience to become engaged emotionally, intellectually and musically. Herworks have been supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, Minnesota StateArts Board, The McKnight Foundation, Metropolitan Regional Arts Council and manyothers. Ms. Mustaphi has been commissioned by the Ordway Center for the PerformingArts and toured her productions throughout the US, Canada and India.

Christian Burns is a Teaching Artist, Performer, and Choreographer. His body of work is built upon interdisciplinary projects relating to the intersection of Improvisation, Choreography, and Training.Some of his collaborators include Hope Mohr, Bobbi Jene Smith, Alessio Silvestrin, Chris Aiken, Ray Chung, Eric Beauschsne, Shinichi Lova-Koga, and Kirstie Simson among others.He was a guest artist with The Forsythe Company and a member of Alonzo King Lines Ballet and James Sewell Ballet among others. He helped create burnsWORK, The Foundry, and Parsons Hall Project Space.His formal training from The School of American Ballet has been complemented by 25 years of Contact Improvisation and Somatic movement practice. He has been commissioned for his choreography and master teaching by dance companies and universities throughout the US, Europe, and Asia.He has been awarded numerous fellowships, residencies, grants, and commissions, as well as being a contributor for When Men Dance; Choreographing Masculinities Across Borders (Oxford University Press).He is currently expanding his new virtual 1:1 coaching program for Improvisational research and continues to be a long-standing faculty member of Alonzo King Lines Ballet Training Program, an Adjunct Professor for Lines Ballet BFA at Dominican University, and in 2023 was a Guest Lecturer for the Stanford University Dept. of Theater & Performance Studies. 

Myo-O Marilyn Habermas-Scher has an extensive background in the performing arts, including choreography, opera, vocal improvisation, performance art and story telling.  She is trained in Qi Gong and Body Mind Centering TM, as well as practicing yoga and Gyrotonics. She is the originator of VoiceWork, a somatically based voice training, which she has offered in private practice for nearly fifty years.  She has taught at several colleges and universities.  She has received a number of grants for her choreographic work, and founded a vocal improvisation group, AWAKE!  In addition, she has offered Voice Healings at Pathways, a complementary healing center in Minneapolis, for three decades.Myo-O has practiced meditation in the Zen tradition since 1975 when she began practicing with Dainin Katagiri roshi, founder of the Minnesota Zen Meditation Center. She was fully ordained and given permission to teach in 2012 by Dokai Georgesen, Head Teacher at Hokyoji Zen Practice Community in SE Minnesota.  She has taught classes and led retreats and lectured in many settings from Unitarian Societies to maximum security prisons.  From 2006 to 2021 she worked as an inter-faith chaplain at Hennepin County Hospital and the University of Minnesota Medical Center, MHealth Fairview.  She is also a mom and grandma to two little boys.

Pam has been creating, teaching and performing dance for over 40 years. She was involved with the Nancy Hauser Dance Company/Hauser Dance from the mid-1980s to 2011 as an apprentice, company member, teacher and choreographer, along with freelancing in the community. As director of MotionArt (cofounded in 2013 with Diane Moncrieff), she is dedicated to providing opportunities for people - no matter their age or ability - to move, express, learn, create and find community in dance – whetherthrough the Ageless Dance class she initiated with Heidi Hauser Jasmin twenty years ago, or through other adult and children's classes, monthly improvisation gatherings, somatic workshops andperformances. Her collaborations with professional and nonprofessional dancers spanning nine decades in age, along with musicians, composers, visual artists and film makers have resulted in over 50 choreographed pieces, eight theater productions and four films. She has taught, performed and/orpresented dance in many Twin Cities venues, several US cities, in Taiwan, Japan, Russia and Ireland, and her work has been supported by grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board, the Jerome Foundation, and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Commission. In 2019, she was a “50 over 50” honoree by AARP/Pollen for her contributions and achievements in the arts and for disrupting outdated beliefs about aging.Pam received a BS in Community Health Education with minors in Dance and Psychology from UW-Madison, where she first delved into the study of Modern Dance. She holds an MA in Kinesiology from the University of Minnesota and has been a Pilates instructor and personal trainer since 1999. She taught “The Articulate Body“ (Dance Kinesiology), Pilates and Modern Dance in the University of Minnesota Dance Department, was a faculty member in the Physical Education department at NorthHennepin Community College, a community health educator for research in the Epidemiology Department at the University of Minnesota and has been a guest artist at several Midwest colleges.As a teacher, Pam draws from her strong interest in both the art and science of the body in motion to offer biomechanically sound classes infused with individual exploration and improvisation. As a choreographer, inspirations are as varied as life itself, planted in her psyche and often manifest when she's not looking. These seeds of inspiration have resulted in a wide body of work - from abstract to theatrical, solo to large ensemble, melancholy to slapstick and are reflective of her fascination with universal principles of motion and universal aspects of being human.

Paul Herwig has been working for over 40 years as a professional visual and performing artist. Paul is the founding Co-Artistic Director/Manager of Off-Leash Area, a dance and theater company creating original interdisciplinary performance work, located in Minneapolis, Minnesota USA, which is now in its 25th year, and has presented 30 original productions. Paul is a graduate of the Ecole Jacques Lecoq (1981-1983), and regularly performs lead and ensemble roles in the company's productions, as well as having designed and built sets for all its 30 productions. Paul is a self-taught visual and digital artist, working in live animated projection art, and projection mapping. Paul has received many awards, including a McKnight Theater Fellowship, 5 MN State Arts Board individual artist grants, a Jerome Travel grant, among others. His set designs and performances have been listed in the Minneapolis press' Best of the Year lists eighteen times since 2002. In 2019, Paul was chosen among a group of US designers to exhibit at the Prague Quadrennial of Performance and Design. Recently, Paul has been working in public art. Earlier this year he presented Facing the Fire (2), a public art project that wrapped the ruins of the former 3rd Police Precinct building with projections and sound. This building is located in the heart of the Minneapolis neighborhood where Paul has had a home for twenty years, and formerly housed the officers who murdered George Floyd, a traumatic event which set off an international movement for racial justice. Most recently, Paul was commissioned by the MN State Fair, and created Canopy/Calliope, a fantasia of carnival rides, farm animals, and musical instruments.Jennifer Ilse grew up in rural northern Wisconsin, and first studied dance in a professional setting in Duluth, Minnesota. She then moved to Eugene, Oregon to continue her studies at the University of Oregon. In Eugene she also studied with the Eugene Ballet under Susan Zadoff of Ballet Russe, at the Musical Feet school of tap, and performed four seasons with the Dance Theatre of Oregon. After moving to Minneapolis in 1997 she co-founded the dance/theater/visual art hybrid company Off-Leash Area, for which she has performed lead roles, choreographed and directed most of its 30 original full-length interdisciplinary productions. She was a City Pages Artist of the Year, has been featured on TPT's MN Original, received 5 Arts Board Artist Initiative grants, was chosen among a group of local choreographers to participate in the NEFA RDDI Dance initiative, and her production work with OLA has garnered 2 Ivey Awards.  Her work as a dance educator has included professional and pre-professional programs at Zenon and TU Dance, to children community education programs in Oregon and Minneapolis, and at studios throughout the Twin Cities. 

Toni Pierce-Sands (Founder & Artistic Director) Prior to co-founding TU Dance, Minnesota native Toni Pierce-Sands performed with Minnesota Dance Theatre, Tanz Forum in Germany, Rick Odums in Paris, and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, where she was a featured soloist in such signature pieces as Revelations, Cry and Rainbow Round My Shoulder. Her command of the Horton Technique has led to teaching posts throughout the United States and Europe. Toni directs programming and teaches classes at TU Dance Center in Saint Paul. She was a full-time core faculty member at the University of Minnesota for twenty years and also served as Director of University Dance Theatre. Toni has been featured in COSMOPOLITAN Germany and GQ publications, the American Express Alvin Ailey commercial, and the Lester Horton Technique instructional DVD series. She has written columns for Dance Studio Life magazine on various pedagogical approaches for modern dance. Toni was awarded a 2004 McKnight Artist Fellowship in Dance, named the Sage Awards' “2011 Leadership Training and a panelist for the 2018 Dance Miami Choreographers' Program. She currently serves as a member of the University of Minnesota's Northrop Advisory Board.

Deneane Richburg (Choreographer, Dancer, former Competitive FigureSkater, Founder/Artistic Director of Brownbody) grew up a competitive figureskater—in spaces where she had to check her blackness at the door, as worldskating was dominated by whiteness and rooted in values that subjugated herancestry's truths; to quote Zora Neale Hurston, she always felt “most coloredwhen [she was] thrown against a sharp white background.” Richburg realizedthe need to carve out space for her ancestral history hence her decision toestablish Brownbody.Since 2013 Brownbody has honored complex narratives of U.S.-based Blackcommunities by disrupting assumptions, and disenfranchising ideologies,around blackness. She received her MFA in dance and choreography fromTemple University in 2007, an MA in Afro-American Studies from UWMadison, and a BA in English and African American Studies from CarletonCollege. Richburg has been choreographing work for both the stage and icesince 2007 most recently completing an evening-length work called “TracingSacred Steps” which brings ring shout onto the ice. Deneane was a recipientof a 2017 McKnight Choreography Fellowship, a 2019 Jerome Hill ArtistFellowship, and a Dance/USA Fellowship to Artists made possible withgenerous funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.

The scope of Nic Lincoln's choreographic career is comprised of 29 works, and he dancedprofessionally in the Twin Cities for over 20 years. His pieces have been commissioned by James Sewell Ballet, The O'Shaughnessy Theater, Hope College, Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp, DITA in Michigan, and the Human Rights Campaign. Most recently, he received the Cowles Center's Generating Room: Open Proposal Initiative (2020), Minnesota State ArtsBoard Artist Initiative Grant (2015), a prestigious commission from Momentum for the Southern Theater, funded by the Walker Arts Theater, the Jerome Foundation, and the Cowles Theater (2015), and was Named One of “25 to Watch” by Dance Magazine (2013), and a McKnight Artist Fellowship for Dance (2011). As a dance artist and activist he has teamed with OutFront MN, The Red Door Clinic, Transforming Families, The MN AIDS Project and The Human Rights Campaign. For his most recent work, “Escalade”, he is teaming with RECLAIM. RECLAIM works to increase access to mental health support so that queer and trans youth may reclaim their lives from oppression in all its forms. Follow Nic on Instagram @popartseeker

SUZANNE COSTELLO joined Stuart Pimsler Dance & Theater in New York City in 1979 and became its Artistic Co-Director in 1984. During her career with the company, she has been highlighted as a performer, choreographer, teacher, and rehearsal director. As Director of Arts & Education and Arts & Healthcare Programs for the company, she creates and facilitates the many community-inclusive projects SPDT has come to be known for nationally and internationally. Over the past decade she has received support from the National Endowment for the Arts for programs across the country that give voice to those whose stories have not been heard. Currently, she is developing a national performance project for persons with spinal cord injury, From Where I Sit, which will be premiered in Birmingham, AL in 2025. Recently, she directed the NEA project I Believe / The South Dakota Prison Project. This five-week program engaged men at the Sioux Falls Penitentiary in creating performance through writing and movement to express their non-carceral stories. Past NEA community performance projects include Our Country's Keepers at the Walter Reed Military Center, Bethesda, MD, engaging active military and veterans; Raising Our Voices for the Birmingham cancer community; and LISTEN / Stories of Cancer told through Movement, Music & Voice, commissioned by Gilda's Club of the Twin Cities, with participants impacted by cancer. https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/389513015Ms. Costello has been invited to present on this body of work at the International Conference on Culture, Health, and Wellbeing Conference in Bristol, UK, and at the International Conference on Parole & Probation in Ottawa, Canada. National presentations have included the National Organization for Arts in Health, Austin, TX; Expressive Therapies Summit, NYC, NY; and Performing Arts Alliance, Atlanta, GA; among others. Ms. Costello's choreographic work has been honored with three Individual Artist Fellowships from the Ohio Arts Council and has been commissioned by national dance companies and individual artists. She directed and choreographed CATS for Broadway at Iroquois, Louisville; Go, Dog, Go! for Metro Theater Company, St. Louis, and Stage One, Louisville; and choreographed Grimm Tales for Children's Theatre Company, Minneapolis. She has been a Guest Artist at colleges and universities across the U.S. and abroad and has twice been a Cowles Guest Artist as well as Affiliate Faculty for six years at the University of Minnesota. In New York City, Costello performed with several companies, including David Gordon Pick Up Co. and Billy Siegenfeld & Dancers. She has also worked with colleague Joe Goode in San Francisco who created a solo for her, Movie Star Life. Ms. Costello began her study of dance under Annelise Mertz at Washington University in St. Louis, where she graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.A. in Dance.

JANE SKINNER PECK  is a researcher, choreographer, dance historian, teacher, writer/playwright and performer. She has worked across  the U.S., Canada, and France for over thirty years.   She found that dance history enables her to combine her love of history with her love of dance. She has extensive training in both modern dance and dance history, directing performances with her company Dance Revels Moving History since 1990. Jane's period choreography conveys varied past cultures and economic classes of the Upper Midwest as well as Europe in a most immediate and authentic way.  She has created work for St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, MN History Center, Sibley Historic Site, Mpls. Institute of Arts,  Macalester College, NY Baroque Dance Company, Carleton College Theater, U of MN , Luther College.  Her work has been seen at the Long Island NY Fringe Festival, Long Island University NY , Winnipeg's Festival de Voyageur, Ordway Center for the Arts, Walker Art Center, and Intermedia Arts among others. Jane studied Renaissance and Baroque dance in California, NY, and France. She studied French-Canadian dance with Jean-Paul Cloutier of Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Metis dance with Sandy Poitra of the Turtle Mountain Ojibwe Reservation of North Dakota.         Jane's dance theater shows involve characters, stories, and live music. Dance Revels toured Jane's show of MN Metis history through dance throughout MN schools and museums for 15 years.  Since 2015 she annually writes and directs new History Alive! Lanesboro Pop-up Plays , with her original scripts about small town history, dance, and music staged in the streets  of historic Lanesboro, MN.        Jane is a highly regarded dance educator, having taught school residencies for 20 years and has mentored teachers in the arts across the state for years through the Perpich Center for Arts Education. She is a frequent grant recipient and has taught at Winona State University, U of MN, UW Madison, Gustavus Adolphus, and Bemidji State. An historian, she is published by MN Historical Society.