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apature 2006: participating artists
Performance
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The Black Cactus Choir includes members Matthew Von Whiteman, Mariane Charline, Dan Dehnhardt, and Heather Nicole--and is a smallcollaborative combining various techniques, movement styles, and artistic mediums to create collage pieces for the stage and the street. The members met and started working together at City College San Francisco in 2004 and have been working together ever since. Black Cactus Choir's movement experiments are informed by: B-Boying, House, Modern Dance (Graham, Taylor, Ailey, Limon, Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane, Cunningham, Katherine Dunham), Tap, Ballet, Pointe, Afro-Haitian, Circus, Hip Hop, Contact Improv, Butoh, Salsa, Flamenco, Clowning, Yoga, Bomba, Plena, Cumbia, Wu Shu, Tumbling, Gymnastics, Chinese Pole, Capoeira, Pilates, Aerial, and Interdisciplinary site-specific public art. Iu-Hui Chua danced with Anna Halprin, Inkboat, SaltFarm Butoh, and Labayan Dance. She has presented her work at ODC and Yugen Presents and is co-director of Nature Theater of Oklahoma. Kara Frame's language is deeply influenced by the juxtaposition of identity politics and the universal philosophy of Tibetan Buddhism after residing in the Himalayas for several years. After discovering the physics of light in 3D Animation and stop-motion puppetry, Kara is continuing a storytelling exploration towards physical theater. Her work cultivates inter-media theater/installation art and its potential to create aesthetic and intercultural dialogues within a community. Kara is interested in the contrast between our embodied mythology, faith and the gritty politics of the daily grotto. Lian Ladia is a student at the San Francisco Art Institute. She did her undergrad in Manila majoring in Philosophy, culminating in a thesis based on Friedrich Nietzsche and Jazz Music. Later on, she took a Post-Baccalaureate in Photography. Currently she is working on video installations and music compositions. She just finished composing the score for the musical production, Movement, held at Bindlestiff Studio Dohee Lee performs Korean traditional dance and music as well as creative music, dance and voice work. She has toured throughout South Korea, China (Bejing), Taiwan, and the U.S. She founded the PURI project in 2004 in Oakland, CA and A Calling to the Spirits ( Chungryung ) project in 2005 in Beijing which she has toured in China since 2005 at Dashazi International Arts Festival. Victoria Mejia is thrilled to be a part of APAture 2006. Her past credits include, Bill of (w)Rights (Ensemble) with The Renegade Theater Co., Justice is But a Seeming (Secretary) produced by Revival Arts Productions and Bindlestiff Studios, Export Quality (Esperanza) by the Gabriela Network writers collective Banyan (Ona) by Jeannie Barroga , Back Bog Beast Bait (Maria) by Sam Shepard, Stop Kiss (Mrs. Winsley/Nurse) by Dianna Son and the Melancholy Play (Ensemble) by Sarah Rhul. She is a graduate of UC Santa Barbara where she studied Theater and Asian American Studies. Locally, she has attended workshops with the San Francisco Mime Troupe and the Intersection for the Arts. She loves being back in the Bay Area and being a part of such an exciting and bold theater community. She sends love to her family and friends. Danny Nguyen left Vietnam in 1982 to come to the United States. His style of movement blends Classical, Modern, and Post-Modern movement, all executed with his unique twist of Vietnamese culture and experience. Nguyen Dance Company (NDC) was formed in June, 1999. Since its initial creation NDC has had the opportunity to perform in a multitude of communities, events and special occasions. Danny would like to continue bringing his company to other cities and Vietnamese communities around the world, and journeyed to Vietnam in December 2005 to begin a cultural exchange with dance companies in Ho Chi Minh City. Shuang Pan is a UC Berkeley student majoring in psychology, with a secret love for dance, which I discovered by waltzing around to radio music in my living room when nobody was home. In addition to dancing, I enjoy painting, reading science fiction/fantasy novels, writing poetry and short stories, talking evening strolls, watching movies, and eating snow cones. Stevie Lee Saxon (Actor, Writer) Graduating with a degree in Dramatic Arts from The University of Kansas before acting and producing short films in Austin, Texas, Steve is currently one of only a handful of students obtaining a Masters in Fine Arts with emphasis in Acting at San Francisco's Academy of Art University. Next year he will debut his one-man stage show "Korean Bad Ass" at an exhilarating 60 minutes in San Francisco playhouses. Alice Shikina received her BFA in theatre from Miami University and has completed some graduate work at the University of Hawaii in Asian theatre and directing. She has been acting since she was 13 and began her directing career in the Czech Republic. Alice directed and produced Being on the Outside in 2003 and past directing credits include The History of Stone , The Garden of Jezebel (Crowded Fire Theatre Co), Stretch Marks (The Prima Mommas), Puppet Therapy , Spider on the Radio , How High the Moon . She also wrote Hara-Kiri for 2004's Short Leaps Festival (Three Wise Monkeys Theatre Company). Her original play, Okinawa 1945 , was produced this past June at NOHspace. Roopa Singh is a force for change, and is often responsible for bringing art into activist spaces. After receiving her law degree in 2003, Roopa toured the Carribbean, performing in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico as a poetess in the Libertad Hip Hop Tour. In 2004 she recorded "Cradle da Sky," for an album dedicated to women in prison called The We That Sets Us Free . Roopa went on to star in San Francisco's National Queer Arts Festival and held it down for the arts at California Peace and Justice Summits for formerly incarcerated folks in Los Angeles and San Francisco . Most recently, Roopa rocked the mic for San Francisco Women Against Rape's (SFWAR) national Artists Against Rape event, and brought women of color together to speak out against violence at the Incite: Color of Violence Conference in New Orleans . Vidya Sundaram is a Bay Area native, but has close ties to her South Asian roots. She began writing and performing about cross-cultural issues in 2004. She is a trained bharatnatyam dancer, and has performed throughout California and in India in solo performances and with the Kala Vandana Dane Company. Last year, Vidya created TwoRoots, a Web site for South Asian diaspora teens (http://www.tworoots.org). Writer/performer, cultural worker, and arts educator Aimee Suzara is emerging as an important voice in the San Francisco Bay Area. A Mills College M.F.A. candidate and a member of queer Pin@y arts collective Kreatibo, she is taking bold steps with her original theatrical production entitled Pagbabalik ("Return"), which recently received a Zellerbach Community Arts Grant and which was selected for CounterPULSE's 2006 Emerging Performance Festival. Her work includes publication in the upcoming Check the Rhyme anthology of women poets, a track on the Eye of the Storm CD and lauded performances at festivals, universities, conferences and panels. Also a longtime activist, Suzara's mission is to create work that builds community through the telling of provocative stories in poetry, song, movement and theatre. Recognizing her role on the continuum of queer, Filipino, women of color, activist and literary histories, she confronts oppression through writing, performance, and workshops for youth and adults. In Pagbabalik , Suzara is joined by a distinctive cast of actors, dancers and musicians: Aimee Espiritu, Geene Gonzales, Lisa Juachon, Frances Sedayao, Ron Quesada, Jen Soriano and Juan Calaf. Theater Rice, the first modern Asian American theatre group at the University of California, Berkeley, was started in the fall of 1998. Theatre Rice was conceived to provide people (particularly, but not exclusively, Asian American) who might not otherwise have a chance to participate in theatrical arts the opportunity to act, write, sing, direct, dance, and learn behind-the-stage techniques. The Asian American aspect of Theatre Rice is important because it is a step towards combating the misrepresentation and lack of representation of the Asian community in American popular culture. By it s mere existence, Theatre Rice is fulfilling its purpose of putting forth ideas that stem from the minds of Asian Americans, and therefore addressing the Asian American population as well as the greater community within Berkeley and beyond. Theatre Rice uses comedy (scripted, improvisational, and sketch), drama, film, dance, stand-up comedy, spoken word, etc. to send forth its message. Twincest is a collaboration between performance and multimedia artists Jez Kuono`ono Lee and Shawn Tamaribuchi. An exploration of sameness and desire though mediums including movement, images, objects and sound, Twincest was named San Francisco Bay Guardian's "Top Ten" for Dance in 2005. Twincest conjoined in 2005 and has performed at The Passing Show and STREAM/fest at CounterPULSE, Samper at Femina Potens, Gender Pirates at El Rio, The Traveling Erotic Art Show (SF) at the Center for Sex and Culture, Fling at SomArts Cultural Center, Translations by Asian American Dance Performances at CounterPULSE. Twincest is in residency at the Jon Sims Center for the Arts and won a grant from the Queer Cultural Center and the San Francisco Foundation. Their work has been called "daring, hot, rough and unexpected" and "intense, beautiful and disturbing." ( www.twincest.net ) Nitya Venkateswaran began her Bharatnatayam training at the age of four from Vishal Ramani in San Jose. She has performed with Ms. Ramani's Dance Company for the past 20 years. She recently embarked on her solo career and has given over 20 solo performances in the Bay Area and India with wide acclaim. Last year she was selected to perform as a soloist in the 27 th San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival and was awarded the San Francisco Foundation's Choreography award for her work as the narrator for the festival. Nitya has also studied modern dance as a student at UC Berkeley and was selected to study at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Center's intensive summer program in NYC in 1998. This year, Nitya will engage in a choreography apprenticeship under her Guru, Mrs. Vishal Ramani, supported by the Alliance of California Traditional Arts' Apprenticeship Program. Nitya currently lives and works in the San Francisco Bay Area. |
