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Christopher Williams Dance will be in residency in September 2021. During their time at Bethany, they will present a work-in-progress showing of both solo and group material for the supernatural characters in their developing evening-length work “Narcissus” performed by an all male cast of acclaimed contemporary dancers. The showing will also include a question and answer session as well as an open discussion between the dancers, the assembled audience, and Christopher Williams.

Bio
Christopher Williams, hailed as “one of the most exciting choreographic voices out there” (The New York Times) and “the downtown prodigy” (The New Yorker) creating “extraordinary feats of visual imagination” (The New York Times), is a choreographer, dancer, and puppet artist who has created over thirty original and collaborative works in New York City and abroad since 1999. In addition to touring internationally in France, England, Italy, Spain, Holland, Colombia, Malawi, Indonesia, and Russia, as well as nationally in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Kalamazoo, Princeton, Bainbridge Island, Lewiston, Carlisle, Interlochen, Kaatsbaan, and Jacob’s Pillow, his works have been presented in many New York City venues including Lincoln Center, City Center, The Joyce Theater, New York Live Arts, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Danspace Project, Dance Theater Workshop, La MaMa, P.S. 122, HERE Arts Center, the 92nd Street Y, Joyce SoHo, Symphony Space, Galapagos Art Space, BRIC Studio, Dixon Place, The John Ryan Theater, Brooklyn Arts Exchange, Solar One, Socrates Sculpture Park, Judson Church, Dance New Amsterdam, The Mulberry Street Theater, The Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural & Educational Center, and One Arm Red, as well as in the Late Night Cabaret of the Jim Henson International Festival of Puppet Theater, the Pesta Boneka International Puppet Biennale, and via American Opera Projects in OPERA America′s New Works Forum.

Christopher was named a choreography fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation in 2021 and received a New York Dance & Performance “Bessie” Award in 2005 for his work Ursula and the 11,000 Virgins (2005), as well as an impromptu Ishmael Houston-Jones “Messie” Award for his work The Golden Legend (2009), which was listed among the 10 best dance performances of 2009 by Joan Acocella in The New Yorker. He has been awarded fellowships from The New York Foundation for the Arts, The Foundation for Contemporary Arts, the Center for Ballet and the Arts, the Bogliasco Foundation for multiple residencies at the Liguria Study Center for Arts & Humanities in Bogliasco, Italy, and was granted a Bessie Schönberg Memorial Endowed Fellowship for a residency at the Djerassi Resident Artists Program. In 2017 he was named an honoree of Exploring the Metropolis after receiving an EtM Choreographer + Composer Residency, and has been granted creative residencies at New York Live Arts as a Live Feed Resident Artist, Harvard University’s Center for Hellenic Studies, Bethany Arts Community, Kaatsbaan Culture Park, Joyce SoHo, Dance New Amsterdam, White Oak Plantation, The Yard, Bates Dance Festival, Mt. Tremper Arts, Robert Wilson’s Watermill Center, on Captiva Island via the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, through Movement Research, the Harkness Dance Center at the 92nd Street Y, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, the Dream Music Puppetry Program, the HERE Artist Residency Program, Bainbridge Dance Center, the Tyrone Guthrie Center in Annaghmakerrig, Ireland, the Anderson Center, and at Yaddo where he was named for the Charles and Candace Wait Residency in 2014. Foundations and organizations that have supported his work include the New York State Council on the Arts, the Jim Henson Foundation, the O′Donnell-Green Music & Dance Foundation, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, American Music Center′s Live Music for Dance Program, the International Festival Society, the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, and the Greenwall Foundation.

Christopher has been commissioned by The Joyce Theater, New York Live Arts, Opéra Royal du Château de Versailles/Opéra National de Bordeaux, English National Opera, Teatro Real/Perm Opera & Ballet Theater, Interlochen Center for the Arts, Dance Theater Workshop, Danspace Project, the Harkness Dance Center and Harkness Repertory Ensemble at the 92nd Street Y, Philadelphia Dance Projects, American Opera Projects, Reid & Harriet Design, The Blanket, 10 Hairy Legs, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Bates Dance Festival, and HERE Arts Center’s Dream Music Puppetry Program, and has set original works on students at Princeton University, NYU′s Tisch School of the Arts, Sarah Lawrence College, Dickinson College, Interlochen Arts Academy, Bainbridge Dance Center, and the Chadwick School. He has also had the great fortune of collaborating with many distinguished artists including renowned opera directors Peter Sellars and Michel Fau, composers Gregory Spears, Nico Muhly, Robert Een, Peter Kirn, David Griffin, and Ivan Jiménez, visual designer Andrew Jordan, costume designers Carol Binion, Ciera Wells, and Timothy Westbrook, lighting designers Joe Levasseur, Kathy Kaufmann, and Carol Mullins, visual artists David R. Harper and Rosario López Parra, choreographers Patti Bradshaw and Kindra Windish, puppeteer and set designer Tom Lee, puppeteers Basil Twist, Lake Simons, Eric Wright, and Matt Acheson, as well as with musical director Raphaël Pichon of Ensemble Pygmalion, and members of Piffaro, Modern Medieval, The New York Consort of Viols, Sonnambula, the Sebastian Chamber Players, Lionheart, and the internationally acclaimed vocal ensemble Anonymous 4. His collaboration with director Michel Fau and musical director Raphaël Pichon for a production of Jean-Philippe Rameau’s Dardanus presented at the Opéra Royal du Château de Versailles won the Grand Prix du Syndicat de la Critique 2015 in the category of “best Spectacle Lyrique of the year” and his collaboration with Peter Sellars on a new adaptation of Henry Purcell’s The Indian Queen presented at The Bolshoi Theater won five Golden Mask Awards in Moscow.

Christopher has danced for Douglas Dunn + Dancers, Rebecca Lazier, Tere O’Connor Dance, Yoshiko Chuma & the School of Hard Knocks, John Kelly, Sally Silvers, Mina Nishimura, Michou Szabo, Yvonne Meier, Jon Kinzel, Renée Archibald, Edisa Weeks, Risa Jaroslow, Nanine Linning, Beppie Blankert, Wendy Rogers, Lisa Gonzales, Eliza Miller, Anita Cheng, and Elise Knudson, and has also performed for Peter Sellars, David Neumann, Fred Ho, and Charles Atlas. As a puppeteer, Christopher has worked with the award-winnning master puppeteer Basil Twist, both serving as the Ballet Captain for the puppets’ choreography as well as developing roles in his versions of the ballets Petrushka and The Rite of Spring. He has also toured in the award-winning work of Dan Hurlin (including Everyday Uses for Sight no. 3 and Hiroshima Maiden), with Phantom Limb Company, and has appeared in works by puppet artists Chris M. Green, Erin K. Orr, Kate Brehm, and Lake Simons.

Christopher was born in Washington, D.C. and grew up in Syracuse, New York where he began early studies of gymnastics, drama, music, and ballet. He earned a diploma from the École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris where he studied physical theatre, acrobatics, and mask traditions from 1996-1998, and received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1999 from Sarah Lawrence College where he studied choreography with the late Viola Farber and puppetry with Dan Hurlin. He has also studied contemporary dance and ballet most notably with Douglas Dunn, Rebecca Lazier, Vicky Shick, Jeremy Nelson, Janet Panetta, Lance Westergard, John Jasperse, June Finch, Janet Charleston, and at the Merce Cunningham Dance Studio, where he received three scholarships for participation in their professional training program. He was an Affiliate Artist in the Dance/Theater departments at Sarah Lawrence College and serves on the Artist Advisory Board for Danspace Project. He lives in Washington Heights.

Christopher′s long-term project Marginalia is fiscally sponsored by the New York Foundation for the Arts.
Christopher’s web log “The Land of Nimbi” may also be viewed here.
Find Christopher on Instagram as @faycavalier.

www.christopherwilliamsdance.com

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AJ Bermudez
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

During her residency, AJ Bermudez will develop a new collection of short stories exploring various dynamics of gender, queerness, privilege, and history. At the core of these stories are characters who are ni de aquí, ni de allá––neither from here nor there––existing in competing realms while belonging to neither.

Bio

AJ Bermudez is an award-winning writer and director who divides her time between Los Angeles and New York. Her past works include The Face of the Earth (winner of the Diverse Voices Award, 2018), Nightingale (winner of the Cinequest Film Festival, 2017), and Hunt (HBMG Foundation Selection, 2017). Her work has been featured at the Yale Center for British Art, the International Festival of Arts & Ideas, the LBGT Toronto Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, Art Basel Hong Kong, and in a number of books and literary publications, including McSweeney’s, The Masters Review, Boulevard, Story, Chicago Review, Columbia Journal, The Offing, Gertrude Press, Hobart, Black Static, White Hot, Lunch Ticket, Baltimore Review, and elsewhere.

In addition to writing and filmmaking, Bermudez is also a former boxer and EMT, and her work gravitates toward contemporary explorations of power, the architecture of privilege, and the evolving dynamics of nature and industry. She is a Writer’s Digest National Award Winner, recipient of the Jameson Prize, a National Merit Scholar, nominee for the Spotlight Culture & Heritage Award, winner of the 2017 WILDsound Film Festival, and winner of the 2018 WeScreenplay Grand Prize. She currently serves as Artistic Director of The American Playbook, a podcast and nonprofit virtual library of plays, events, and interviews with writers, and was recently named Associate Editor of The Maine Review. Her first solo-written feature film premiered in 2018. She is an alum of the Cambridge Writers’ Workshop, one of the ISA’s Top 25 Writers to Watch, a 2021 Finalist for One Story’s Adina Talve-Goodman Fellowship, and winner of the 2021 Alpine Fellowship Writing Prize.

Artist’s social media:
Instagram: instagram.com/a.j.bermudez/
Twitter:
twitter.com/amandajbermudez
Website:
amandajbermudez.com

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Tochukwu Okafor
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

During his time as a Bethany Arts Community Artist-in-Residence, Tochukwu plans to revise his collection of stories, which ranges from speculative fiction to literary fiction, varying in styles and length, exploring the different manifestations of grief and depression in the lives of Nigerians in Nigeria and Nigerian-Americans in America. He also will be working on his debut novel. Set in Nigeria and the US, Tochukwu’s novel investigates the coming-of-age story of a young boy and seeks to examine themes across Igbo mysticism, mythology, sexuality, masculinity, religion, and mental health.

Bio

Tochukwu Okafor is a Nigerian writer whose work has appeared in the 2019 Best Small Fictions, the 2018 Best of the Net, The Guardian, Harvard’s Transition Magazine, Columbia Journal, and elsewhere. He is a 2022 Good Hart Artist-in-Residence, a 2021 PEN America Emerging Voices Fellow, a 2021 Wellstone Center in the Redwoods (WCR) Writing Fellow, a 2021 GrubStreet Emerging Writer Fellow, a 2021 Sundress Academy for the Arts Writer-in-Residence Fellow, a 2021 Jack Straw Writing Fellow, a 2021 Gish Jen Fiction Fellow, a 2021 Bethany Arts Community Artist-in-Residence, a 2021 Frank Conley Memorial Scholar, a 2021 Albertina Tholakele Dube Scholar for Young Writers, a 2021 Longleaf Writers Conference BIPOC Scholar, and an alumnus of the 2021 Tin House Workshop. He is also a 2018 Rhodes Scholar finalist, a 2018 Kathy Fish Fellow, and winner of the 2017 Short Story Day Africa Prize for Short Fiction. He has been shortlisted for the 2017 Awele Creative Trust Award, the 2016 Problem House Press Short Story Prize, the 2016 Southern Pacific Review Short Story Prize, and has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He was a member of the 2016 Short Story Day Africa Writing Workshop and the 2015 Association of Nigerian Authors Creative Writing Workshop. He holds a master’s degree from Carnegie Mellon University and has received scholarships and fellowship grants from the Worcester Arts Council, Kundiman, Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, Etisalat (now 9mobile), the MTN Foundation, GrubStreet, Fishtrap, Mendocino Coast Writers’ Conference, the Boston Writers of Color Group, and Exxon Mobil. He lives in Worcester, MA, and is at work on a novel and a story collection.

Artist’s social media:
Facebook: facebook.com/emmanuel.t.okafor/
Instagram: instagram.com/tochukwu_okafor/
Twitter:
twitter.com/toch_okafor

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Carole Bonicelli
Dates of Residency:

October 12th – October 23rd

Residency Plan

Carole will use her time in residence to complete illustrations for her children’s book. The illustrations will focus on the interaction between humans and the natural world. Carole uses intricate silk paintings to bring her stories to life.

Bio

My undergraduate school was The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. I received my Master of Fine Arts from Yale University. As a Fulbright Scholar to Venice, Italy I studied Byzantine Architecture and mosaics. A Fulbright Memorial Fellowship to Japan gave me the opportunity to satisfy a lifelong interest in East Asian art and culture. I am a published author and illustrator of children’s books, and my artwork is in syndication on the Sesame Street TV series.

I see art (in all its manifestations) as social imperative. My painting “Venus Revisited” was included in the book Art.Rage.Us. and traveled around the world with other art works, raising awareness about breast cancer and the importance of early detection. I am passionate about environmental conservation and have been the recording artist on Conservation International Expeditions around the world. My onsite drawings and videos have been used to share information about the underlying causes of climate crisis.

As the Chair of Fine Arts at a private school in Westchester, NY for 30 years, I introduced and taught courses in drawing, painting, sculpture, ceramics, stained glass, glass fusing, printmaking, computer graphics and Art History. I was also Adjunct Professor of Art at Pace University. As an artist who teaches, I found immense rewards in sharing my passion for learning through the discipline of the arts. When I retired from teaching, I spent September as the Artist in Residence at The North Rim of The Grand Canyon. It was a sublime experience in an awesome landscape. These experiences speak to my soul and inform my art whether I’m working with pastels, paint, or clay. My life as an artist has been a journey inspired by my reverence for nature and my respect for human culture.

Artist’s social media:

Website:
carolebonicelli.com

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Alexander Diaz
Dates of Residency:

October 12th – October 23rd

Residency Plan

Alexander Diaz and Rebecca Gaul are sharing this residency opportunity to continue developing their work; Alexander Diaz will be working on “Getting Closer to Coral,” a world he is building within a space as a reflection of memories.

Bio

Alexander Diaz (Bronx, NY) began his training at the Bronx Dance Academy and then the Bronx Dance Theater. During high school, Diaz was a Fellowship recipient at The Ailey School and later received his Certificate from The University of the Arts for performance in dance. Alex graduated from the LINES Ballet Training Program in 2017 and is currently working with Maurya Kerr’s tinypistol, Earl Mosley’s Diversity of Dance, and Christal Brown’s INSPIRIT.

Alexander Diaz and Rebecca Gual are currently part of Pepatian’s 8th annual Dancing Futures: Artist & Mentor Collaborative Residency 2021, produced in partnership with BAAD! Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance, which offers emerging Bronx-based and/or dance artists of color with resources, performance opportunities, mentorship, and documentation. pepatian.org

Artist’s social media:

Instagram’s: https://www.instagram.com/pepatian_pepartsbx/

https://www.instagram.com/alexanderdiaz.ata/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pepatian.southbronx

Website: pepatian.org

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Jenny Browne
Dates of Residency:

October 12th – October 23rd

Residency Plan

While in residence, Jenny plans to continue work on Here to See You, a book-length sequence of experimental ekphrastic poems imagined as an extended conversation about place and perception with her collaborator and friend, the visual artist Katie Pell, in the months following her death.

Bio

Jenny Browne’s most recent book is Fellow Travelers: New and Selected Poems, Volume 17 in the TCU Press Texas Poet Laureate Series. A former James Michener Fellow at the University of Texas, she has received the Cecil Hemley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry and two creative writing fellowships from the Texas Writers League.  Her poems and essays have appeared in numerous publications including American Poetry Review, Bennington Review, Boston Review, Copper Nickel, Garden and Gun, Oxford American, New England Revies, The Nation, The New York Times and Tin House. She teaches at Trinity University and lives in San Antonio, Texas. In Spring 2020 she was the Distinguished Fulbright Scholar in Creative Writing at Queens University, Belfast Northern Ireland.

Artist’s social media:
Instagram: @jennybrownepoetry
Twitter: @jennypoet

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Kate Abbruzzese
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

During Kate’s time at Bethany Arts Community, Kate will be expanding her award-winning short play, “An Evening With the Macbeths” (winner of the 2019 Red Bull Short New Play Festival), into a full-length which focuses on the women of Shakespeare’s “Macbeth”. The expanded version of Kate’s play is currently titled “Sleep That Knits Up”

Bio

Kate Abbruzzese studied drama, psychology, and a smattering of literature and poetry at Vassar College, where she also participated in the selective Vassar Improv and Vassar Shakespeare Troupe. Her senior project, playing Lady Macbeth in an all-female Macbeth at Vassar’s Powerhouse Theatre, earned her the Molly Thatcher Kazan Memorial Prize. After her graduation, she apprenticed at the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival and subsequently spent four years acting regionally before gaining acceptance into NYU’s Graduate Acting Program, where she received her MFA and the Olympia Dukakis and Ron Van Lieu Scholarships. While at NYU, she wrote and directed her first play, which was one of four selected to be performed for prospective students during audition weekend.

Kate has acted in 17 of Shakespeare’s works (favorite roles include Desdemona in Othello, Julia in Two Gentlemen of Verona, Perdita in The Winter’s Tale and the titular role in Hamlet), and written several of her own plays based off of Shakespeare’s characters: Before the Storm, an exploration of Caliban and Miranda’s relationship prior to The Tempest, Motley Fool, an imagining of Rosalind and Orlando’s marriage after As You Like It, and An Evening With the Macbeths, a vignette examining the domestic side of Shakespeare’s most infamous couple. The latter two received a place in Red Bull Theatre Company’s Short Play Festival in 2016 and 2019, respectively.

Aside from acting and writing, Kate moonlights as an illustrator and cartoonist, and recently completed the first issue of “The Zero Waste Comic” in partnership with the intrepid Kayla Miller. You can see more of her art on instagram at @theheartoonist or by visiting www.studiozayzay.com.

Artist’s social media:

Instagram: @theheartoonist
Facebook: Kate Abbruzzese
Website: studiozayzay.com

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Matthew Cumbie
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

Matthew Cumbie, Tom Truss, and Diane Samuels residency at Bethany Arts Community will focus on the continued development of ReWritten, a performance project and community engagement series that explores the often silenced intimate relationship between authors Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville. Moving between their lives, work, and remaining letters, ReWritten uses this intergenerational queer love story that helped shape American literature as a portal to reflect on friendship, writing, social morés, letters and notions of queerness. Conceived of by Tom Truss and co-created with Matthew Cumbie, ReWritten lives on stage and in the communities, they partner with through performances and a constellation of community engagement activities. This residency will focus on furthering some of the choreographic elements in relation to a new “paper installation” that will be woven into performances and community workshops. Diane, an internationally recognized visual artist, will create micro-transcriptions of novels on treated paper as part of the interactive installation.

Bio

Matthew Cumbie (he/him/his) is a collaborative dancemaker and artist educator living in Washington, DC. His work has been supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, the DC Commission for the Arts and Humanities, the Arcus Foundation, and the Somerville Arts Council. Originally from Houston, Texas, Matthew holds an MFA in dance from Texas Woman’s University and is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at Colby College.

Artist’s social media:

Instagram: @pavelzoubakfineart, @makerbakershaker, @askyourgayuncle, @matthewhcumbie
Facebook: @ Tom Truss (facebook.com/tommytrussiii), @ Matthew Cumbie (facebook.com/matthewhcumbie)

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Tom Truss
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

Tom Truss, Matthew Cumbie and Diane Samuels residency at Bethany Arts Community will focus on the continued development of ReWritten, a performance project and community engagement series that explores the often silenced intimate relationship between authors Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville. Moving between their lives, work, and remaining letters, ReWritten uses this intergenerational queer love story that helped shape American literature as a portal to reflect on friendship, writing, social morés, letters and notions of queerness. Conceived of by Tom Truss and co-created with Matthew Cumbie, ReWritten lives on stage and in the communities, they partner with through performances and a constellation of community engagement activities. This residency will focus on furthering some of the choreographic elements in relation to a new “paper installation” that will be woven into performances and community workshops. Diane, an internationally recognized visual artist, will create micro-transcriptions of novels on treated paper as part of the interactive installation.

Bio

Tom Truss (he/him/his) is a community-based artist, educator and performer. Truss has performed and/or shown his work at The Kennedy and Lincoln Centers, The Joyce, On the Boards, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, Roundhouse Theatre, and The New Zealand Fringe, to name a few, as well as in rivers, used furniture stores, and fire escapes. He currently co-hosts Ask Your Gay Uncle, an advice podcast, with his gay nephew, and is devising a dance/theatre/puppet solo show called Behind The Tapestry.

Artist’s social media:

Instagram: @askyourgayuncle
Facebook: @ Tom Truss (facebook.com/tommytrussiii)

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Martinez E-B
Dates of Residency:

October 12th – October 23rd

Residency Plan

Martinez E-B is contemplating a narrative of work that explores and interrogates his grandfather’s decision to change the family name and how that past decision impacted the events of his life. As the family name was Harley, and then changed to Garcias, this prompted an adoption into the Latino/Hispanic community that would shape who Martinez E-B became as person, artist, and social justice roles. The project will be finalized in the form of a video that will combine spoken (scripted and raw) word, illustrated images, camera video, and picture stills.

Bio

MARTINEZ E-B is a native of inner-city Cleveland, OH and now lives and works out of the Chicago, IL area. He is a multidisciplinary artist who creates works that simulate the cultural/social/political fog of his upbringing. E-B has illustrated and authored books, has had his works adapted for theater, and has shown in numerous exhibits nationally. Recently, he has been featured in LEF(t) a broadsheet publication by Critical Practice Inc. NYC, and ARTFORUM International Magazine Critics’ Picks. He received his B.F.A. from Cleveland Institute of Art and his M.A. in Interdisciplinary Arts from Columbia College Chicago.

Artist’s social media:

Website: martinezeb.com

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Michael Caines
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

While in residency at Bethany, Michael will work on an illustrated book themed around a child’s-eye view of growing up with a parent suffering from mental illness or addiction. In this story the protagonist is Little Bun – a young rabbit – who embarks on a rabbit sized heroic journey akin to Dante or Homer, with the attendant mythic imagery: Narcissus cats; a transgender Minotaur; loving Harpies; a mouse army, and so on. This book is akin to an Alice in Wonderland meets Dante absurdist journey of self-discovery and empowerment. Or perhaps Beatrix Potter co-mingled with German Expressionism.

Bio

Michael Caines most recent exhibitions include Cat Art Show Los Angeles, Mammalia at Galerie Youn in Montreal, and Volta NYC with Katharine Mulherin, a solo art fair booth featured in the New York Times. Past residencies include Millay Colony, SFAI, I-Park, The Bemis Center, The Banff Centre, Jentel, and Gibraltar Point. Caines has been awarded fellowships from the Avery and Chalmers foundations, and grants from the Canada Council, The Ontario Arts Council, and the Toronto Arts Council. His book, Revelations & Dog, a graphic version of the Book of Revelations, was released in March, 2010 by Mark Batty Publisher in New York. A ten year survey of Caines animal and human themed work, Wild/Tame, was exhibited at the Art Gallery of Peterborough in Canada in 2011. Michael Caines was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia in Canada, and has made New York city home for the past twelve years.

Artist’s social media:

Instagram: michaelcaines

Facebook: facebook.com/michaelcainespaintings

Website: michael-caines.com

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Molly Horan and Amy Engelhardt
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

Over the course of the two-week residency, Molly Horan and Amy Engelhardt will be be working through the first act of their original musical, “The Completely True Story of West High’s 66th Annual Charity Lockdown,” a 90-minute pop-punk musical written to be performed by teenagers. Theatrical material for teens is hard to come by so they are creating a piece that is smart, funny, and above all – relevant. At its core, their musical is about teenagers recognizing their power and inner strength and asserting their right to a livable future.

Bio

Composer/lyricist/arranger/playwright AMY ENGELHARDT wrote the score for Off-Broadway Alliance Best New Musical nominee BASTARD JONES. Other theatrical writing credits include TRIPTYCH (book/music/ lyrics, New York Transit Museum Commission), lyrics for adaptations of Carl Sagan’s CONTACT (2009 Puget Sound Theatre Award), TESLA (New Musicals Foundation) and music/lyrics for A COMEDY OF ERAS (with the Flying Karamazov Brothers). Amy received the Burman Award for Songwriting from the Manhattan Association of Cabarets (MAC) and was Creator/Artistic Producer of TUNE IN TIME, New York’s Musical Theater Game Show (“cerebral fun & games… the BMI Musical Theatre workshop on steroids” – Stage Buddy) at the York Theatre.

From 1998-2012, Amy recorded 4 albums and toured the US and Europe as sole female vocalist/writer for Grammy-nominated, genre-busting vocal band The Bobs. And as Mother Superior of the Chattering Order of St. Beryl in Amazon Prime’s GOOD OMENS promo campaign, Amy led a gaggle of rock-belting, flash mobbing nuns at series premieres and events in London, New York, LA and Austin’s South by Southwest. She also produced their EP UNHOLY NIGHT for Amazon Music and would LIKE to say she is Neil Gaiman’s new BFF.

Amy just filmed her new play IMPACT at Michigan’s Playhouse at White Lake, a co-production with the cell theatre in NYC, where she is now a Resident Artist. The show was developed in early 2020 at the National Winter Playwrights Retreat in Colorado. Amy swears that her second solo album, FINISH WHAT YOU, delayed TWICE now, will still be released in 2020.

Molly Horan’s debut novel, Epically Earnest, a queer YA retelling of The Importance of Being Earnest, will be published in 2022 by HMH, and her first picture book, I Have Seven Dogs, will be published in 2023 by Penguin/Random House. After receiving her MFA in writing for children and young adults from The New School, she pursued a career in writing for the web, with pieces published online by Refinery29, The New York Times, The AV Club, Shondaland, and many other sites. A member of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop, her original songs have been performed at 54 Below and The Duplex. Her play The Patron Saint of Other Women won Georgia College Arts and Letters’ 2021 Drama Prize.

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Nikki Brake-Sillá
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

Nikki Brake-Sillá will be researching and beginning a play that brings disability into conversation with the current state of a “post” racial America when Gabriela Johnson, a Black attorney with Crohn’s disease and lupus, argues for Blackness to be included amongst the list of disabilities covered in the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Bio

Nikki Brake-Sillá is a playwright and filmmaker. She is the Founder of DrAW (Dramatists At War) and an inaugural member of Jouska PlayWorks. Nikki’s full-length plays include TROUBLE OF THE WORLD, Finalist (Terrance McNally Award, Lark Apothetae, Space on Ryder – Family Residency), Semi-Finalist (O’Neill, Bay Area Playwrights Festival); DEAR ANN, Residency (The Mitten Lab), Semi-Finalist (Premiere Stages); IN DEFENSE OF OURSELVES, Commission (Philadelphia Women’s Theater); and, GTFOH. Her full-length narrative, A WEATHERING, was a Semi-Finalist (Middlebury Scriptlab) and Second Round Selection (Sundance Narrative Lab). L&D, a one-hour pilot, was a 2021 Semi-Finalist (The Orchard Project and Middlebury TV Scriptlab). A.M.A. – AGAINST MEDICAL ADVICE (monologue) was selected for Annenberg’s Screening Scholarship Media Festival 2021 and was a Semi-Finalist at The Black Motherhood & Parent New Play Festival.

Nikki has received funding from The Sachs Foundation, RECPhilly – Black Music City, The Puffin Foundation, The Lark, the Princess Grace Foundation, the Leeway Foundation, and the Regional Center for Women Artists. Nikki received her B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania and her M.F.A. from the City College of New York. She is a proud member of the Dramatists Guild and Directors Gathering. ginifilms.com

Artist’s social media:

Instagram: instagram.com/goosie1920
Twitter: twitter.com/Tirapidi

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Summer Kodama
Dates of Residency:

September 21st – October 3rd

Residency Plan

Summer Kodama will be using her residency to compose multiple multi-disciplinary pieces of music inspired by the literary works of East Asian and Asian-American authors. She will be exploring the Asian diaspora and its influence in the framework of cultural assimilation through the careful analysis of chosen literature. Summer sees her project as a “take” on making the AAPI experience more visible through the vulnerable process of integrating and re-contextualizing the poetically relatable through the creation of melodies and sonic worlds. In addition to composing new work, Summer looks forward to the opportunity to further explore and articulate how to make understanding intersectionality a necessary part of one’s artistic output. Being primarily a jazz-trained bassist and composer, she believes jazz is a style of music rooted in racial activism, emotional vulnerability, and the liberation of Black America; and integral to the musicality and expression of the formerly mentioned is improvisation. Summer’s projected work will include integrating the emotional complexities of social justice through her utilization of researched literature in compositions with improvised sections. This project will be the union of music, literature and the humanities.

Bio

Summer Kodama is a Japanese-American upright/electric bassist, composer and educator. She passionately strives to understand, respect, and express as many different perspectives of the human experience through her compositions and collaborative efforts. She feels especially drawn towards improvised music and composition as a platform for her expression and her beliefs.
Passionate about promoting diversity and inclusion awareness, Summer utilizes her creativity and musical community as a means for outreach. Her most recent venture entailed organizing a concert of AAPI composer-performers and diversity/inclusion initiatives through Nevada School of the Arts.

Summer’s most recent awards include a multi-disciplinary arts residency at Bethany Arts (2021) and the 2020 Downbeat Student Music award for Outstanding Composition for Large Ensemble. She also has won numerous awards and fellowships through the Jazz Education Network (2019), the Monterey Next Generation Jazz Festival (2017) and McGill University (2018-2020). She has participated in residencies at the Banff Centre, Marrowstone Music Festival, the Disneyland All-American College Band and the BMI Jazz Composers Workshop. She is grateful to have performed alongside Tyshawn Sorey, Kenny Rampton, Jean-Michel Pilc, Claire Daly, Post- Modern Jukebox among many others. During her time as a graduate fellow at McGill University, she served as composer-in-residence for one of the premiere jazz ensembles, under the tutelage of honored Canadian composers: Jean-Nicolas Trottier and Joe Sullivan.

When not performing, Summer spends her time developing an already recognizable voice as both a composer and player. Her compositions showcase risk taking improvisations; to play with her requires embracing the unexpected. Foil to her fearlessness is a genuine desire to connect with audience members in terms they can relate to. Her compelling writing assures that listeners leave with lasting impressions of new sonic worlds.

In addition to her music career, Summer is a co-founder of Healing Hearts Cooperative, an organization dedicated to creating an inclusive community through virtual wellness events.
Summer recently completed her master’s degree at McGill University for Jazz and Composition.

Artist’s social media:

website: summerkomusic.com

instagram: https://www.instagram.com/summerkobama/

soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/summer-kodama

bandcamp: https://summerkodama.bandcamp.com