Women immigrants take flight in Carla Forte’s Bird Woman
For several years, dance and film artist Carla Forte has interviewed scores of women immigrants, women who’ve crossed borders, who brought their children, or whose mothers brought them to a new country. Women who, like Forte, risked all to start a new life in a strange new place.
The Next Stage
Moving on from a beloved longtime home is hard. So many memories, experiences, and emotions contained and created within those walls.
A World of Movement
The gorgeous visual and movement carnival of the annual ScreenDance Miami festival is much more than an annual delight for Miami. The festival gives us a glimpse into creative minds, new ideas, and emerging trends throughout the dance world, a breathtaking artistic spectrum we’d never get to see simply via the limited number of live performances in South Florida.
Acclaimed Dance Artist Shamel Pitts Brings the Heat in Touch of RED
Dance artist Shamel Pitts usually takes about nine months to make a piece. But Touch of RED, Pitts’ duet with Tushrik Fredericks, was birthed in a two-year-long, pandemic-bred incubation that fostered a particularly intense collaboration. Forged in the sweaty heat of physical closeness, in the instantaneous reaction of souls laid bare in a fraught arena illuminated by scarlet light, Touch of RED may be Shamel’s most personal work.
Teo Castellanos: F.Punk Junkies
I grew up with 70’s soul, funk, salsa, then came hiphop and punk, then post-punk and new wave. That’s always been me. Then I got interested in Afro-Futurism and Afro-punk. I like the reclaiming of punk music by people of color, specifically Black people. We tend to forget rock music comes from Black culture. That’s why Bad Brains and Fishbone are key – and because I love them.
ScreenDance Miami Redux – That’s So Miami
The annual Screendance Miami festival shows films from around the world. But this year, we’re reprising films by Miami artists at the North Beach Bandshell, because the most compelling entries are from our own backyard.
Randolph Ward: Unconventional
Retired ballet dancer Randolph Ward celebrates outsider power in his Here & Now piece Unconventional; the transgender, vogue, and drag artists who not only re-define their sexuality and gender, but use that reinvention as a source of creativity and community. Who say ‘you don’t see how I shine?’ I’m gonna make a world that does.’
Alejandro Rodriguez: In the Brackish Water
Alejandro Rodriguez planned to be an actor. But when the Miami-born son of Cuban exiles saw Teo Castellanos’ NE Second Avenue, the game-changing solo theater piece Castellanos originated for Here & Now in 2002, it sparked a different creative ambition.
Symone Titania Major: Home
Until now, Symone Titania Major has focused on showcasing the richness of Miami-Dade’s Black community.
Cecilia Benitez & Stephanie Perez: Manteca
Cecilia Benitez and Stephanie Perez are cultural twins. Both 24, Miami-born daughters of Cuban exiles raised in ‘Wescheser,’ the heart of suburban exilio. Both dance graduates of New World School of the Arts – where they became close – and Pittsburgh’s Point Park College. Where they discovered the Miami conundrum of living on the multiple hyphens of being Cuban-Latina-American.
