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Sheila & Hughes Potiker Theatre  I  March 14-15

Choreographed by: Juan Carlos Blanco, Daunté Fyall & holly johnston

Directed by: Bernard Brown

 

About the Show

WinterWorks 2025 is a timely and powerful collection of dance works celebrating difference, looking at what binds us together, and is a call to action, guided by radical love. A new work by holly johnston, “roots of loving us” is concerned with origin stories, both the biological and those born of love while centering our roots, heritage and how we choose our families. Juan Carlos Blanco’s Afro-Cuban dance entitled “Briyumba Congo” is a merger of the ancient and the modern, of the folkloric and the contemporary that illustrates a specific moment in the Caribbean nation’s colonial history. Based in Malinke traditions, Daunte Fyall’s work “The Fall of the Great Baobab” is focused on the story of Sundiata, the last king of Mali, and the loss of the majestic Baobab tree - an effect of the climate crisis that plagues our world.

  

Tickets        

 

Content Warning 

Please be advised this production contains :

  • strobe effects
  • gunshot sound effects
  • panicked screams following gunshot sound effect

 

WinterWorks25.pngClick image to view digital program!

 The Cast

Juan Carlos Blanco's Piece

Jackie Avery

Vrisika Chauhan

Abril Chimy

Italy Clark

Ricardo Espinoza

Katie Gillespie

Arianna Kricun

Qinpei Deborah Li

Yoonjin Lim

Omar Lopez

Kaiya Macleod

Natalia Morales

Alisa Myerchin

Lili Olah

Autumn Pedranti

Wanxin Peng

Trista Pradhan

Lauren Sandoval

Yael Sela

Thalia Venidis

Anni Wu

Vivian Wu

Charlotte Yu

 

Daunté Fyall's Piece

Yali Alsberg

Andrea Barriere

Natalia Balderas

Ebone' Brower

Kennedy Byrdsong

Celia Carton

Kelly Callejo

Valeria Corona

Alexia Demiroska

Brenda Estrada

Kaitlyn Fong

Saana Kayser

Omar Lopez

Hannah Lucas

Natalia Morales

Cassidy Morgan

Talita Myrtogiou-Olbrys

Vicky Pham

Nazia Quadir

Valeria Ruiz

Hope Sato

Mars Stern

Allen Valencia

Theresa Velasco

Shania Zhang

 

holly johnston's Piece

Yali Alsberg

Mark Betancourt

Catalina Bilandzijia

Ella Chan

Aanya Choksi

Nicole Constan

Jillian Curry

Kayla Hess

Makenna Holst

Ricky Lozano

Emmy Nourse

Danny Reyes

Malie Wong

 

Creative and Stage Management Team

Stage Manager: Karina Ortega

Assistant Stage Manager: Laura Yang

Assistant Stage Manager: Emjay Williams

Production Manager: Laura Manning

Production Assistant: Maya Canales

Production Assistant: Sadie Muzzo

Scenic Designer: Muting Fan

Scenic Designer: Roulin Zhao

Costume Designer: Natalie Barshow

Lighting Designer: Taylor Olson

Lighting Designer: Jake Olson

Sound Designer: Chloe Lias

 

About the Director

Bernard Brown is a performing artist, choreographer, filmmaker, educator and arts activist working at the crossroads of Blackness, Queerness and belonging. A first-generation college graduate, Brown earned an MFA in choreography from UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance. Most recently he taught dance at Loyola Marymount University and is currently a California Arts Council Established Artist Fellow.

As artistic director of Bernard Brown/bbmoves, a social justice dance theater company, he choreographs for stage, specific sites, film and opera. Brown also conducts workshops, lectures, presentations and master classes in the U.S. and internationally, from Israel and Panama to Africa and Brazil. He is a core member of Street Dance Activism and an ongoing collaborator with Dancing Through Prison Walls, an abolitionist project.

Brown’s work has been presented across the globe, including the Centre de Développement Choregraphique La Termitière, The Saint Louis Black Repertory Company, Dance Camera Istanbul, the Japanese American National Museum, among others. He was also recently invited to be part of a U.S. State Department sponsored two-city tour to Burkina Faso, West Africa in 2023.

For nearly three decades, Brown has toured with and performed in the choreography of leaders of the dance field, including Lula Washington Dance Theatre, David Rousseve/REALITY, Donald McKayle, Rennie Harris, Rudy Perez, Pat Taylor, Doug Elkins, Dwight Rhoden, Janessa Clark, Shapiro and Smith Dance, TU Dance and Lucinda Childs, to name a few.

More career highlights include restaging Donald McKayle’s canonical “Games” for the Kennedy Center’s “Masters of African American Choreography,” performing on the Daytime Emmy’s, Penumbra Theater’s “Black Nativity” and Donald Byrd’s “Harlem Nutcracker,” and being the titular principal dancer in Nike’s “12 Miles North: The Nick Gabaldon Story,” the first documented Afro-Mexican American surfer. Brown is also a proud member of the American Guild of Musical Artists.

Brown’s wide-ranging commissions have included the City of Los Angeles, Santa Monica Symphony, South Chicago Dance Theater, the Fowler Museum and a host of universities and community organizations. Brown has also developed work in residencies with The Music Center, Johns Hopkins University, Institute of Contemporary Art Los Angeles, B Street Theater, Loyola Marymount University, Theatre Soleil (Burkina Faso) and Dance Italia.

Additionally, Brown is published in the peer-reviewed dance journal, Dancer-Citizen, and in The Activist History Review. He conceived of and curates Rooted Rhythmic Futures, a dance series and festival that brings Blackness, Indigeneity and Queerness squarely to the center of our consciousness. His activism has been featured in Dance Magazine, the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times.