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Dancer Merián Soto kneels with one knee slightly higher than the other. Her body faces the camera but her eyes are downcast. Her medium length gray hair falls towards her face. She is wearing a flowy rust-colored top and loose khaki-colored pants. In her outstretched hands she holds two curved branches. The branch in her left hand is nearly bent in half and almost touches the floor. The branch in her right hand extends in a graceful arc above her head, mirroring the casual grace in Soto’s pose.
Photo: Bill Hebert
  • Interviews

I am the Archive

Ellen Miller

Still dancing, Merián Soto reflects on her storied career.

Shavon Norris stands on stage in black clothing with her eyes closed and mouth open as if shouting in discomfort, with her hands covering part of her face. There is a person playing the upright bass in the background, and a sliver of blue and yellow lighting behind Norris.
Photo: Johanna Austin
  • Reviews

Shavon Norris’ CRONING (solo.duet 48:25) at The Philadelphia Death and Arts Festival

Caitlin Green

A work that makes space for the constant tug of death

ight slanted grass supports two performers escaping from a fleshtight yellow and bark-brown garment, a “bodysuit.” One performer lies on the ground, horizontal to the left of the standing figure, with an arm extending upwards.
Photo: Naomieh Jovin, courtesy of BlackStar Projects
  • Reviews

Venus Flytrap: A goddess bound to this earth

Noel Price-Bracey

Spring has arrived, and the earth is enlivened.

a book with a black cover and and the words Defending Rumba in Havana; The Sacred and Black Corporeal Undercommons written in blue, green, organge, yellow and pink.
Photo: des amaiya
  • Reviews

“Yo te salvo a ti; tú me salvas a mí”

desire amaiya

Berry documents how rumba counters predetermined sanctions and barriers imposed by a money hungry and stratifying regime.

A person wearing a leather skirt and thick black beads around their neck like a warrior stares intently at the camera, one arm extended towards us with the palm out. An upturned golden urn is behind them.
Photo: Steven Pisano
  • Reviews

Ankita Sharma’s dhoka/Betrayal/: Militarization and Myth-Making

Brendan McCall

Ankita Sharma's intimate dance interrogates their relationship with India.

January, 2025. Lisa Kraus dances solo at Tictac Art Centre. Facing stage left, Kraus crosses her left thigh behind her right. Her knees meet. The tops of her left toes press into the ground as her right heel lifts in a demi releve. Kraus releases her sternum to the sky, elbows pulled back, forearms lifted, face tipped toward the ceiling.
Photo: Arnaud Beelen
  • Interviews

Part 2: On Dance Writing, Improvisation, and Dancing Forever—An Interview with Lisa Kraus

Charly Santagado

Kraus takes on the role ‘missionary for dancing forever’

Portia, a white trans non-binary person, crouches over a mix of DJ mixer, wires, and opened journals strewn across the floor. They wear a black tank top and athletic shorts, and focus in on a laptop. The glow from the laptop and other technical elements subtly illuminate Portia.
Photo: Ofentse Kwenaite
  • Reviews

When the Muzzle Comes Off, Who Do You Bite?

Rachel DeForrest Repinz

Portia Wells finds their bark.

A young man, nude and with his face hidden, squeezes his legs together while his arms are curved downward from his sides, as if his fists are carrying two imaginary buckets. He is in a room next to a white sofa, in front of an abstract painting composed of light blue strokes, and with a vase of violets near his feet.
Photo: Matthew Morrocco
  • Reviews

Dancing Beyond the Void

Brendan McCall

An emerging choreographer´s dance about AIDS from a queer, Gen Z perspective

A black and white image of Lucia Dlugoszewski swinging her arms while holding percussion sticks and kneeling in front of a line of wooden blocks. she wears a dress and her expression is focused on the instruments positioned in front of her.
Photo courtesy of Bowerbird
  • Reviews

Erick Hawkins Dance Company in Pure Lucia: Quidditas Suchness

Caitlin Green

Hawkins’ dance creates a language of subtleties, compelling and engaging in its simplicity and intentionality

Danielle Currica, one of the four soapbox dancers, lunges low and extended on a diagonal to the left front of the stage. She looks intently, perhaps searching, with wide eyes, wearing a long blue garment with fabric extensions behind her attached to four ropes, faintly seen extending into darkness beyond.
Photo: Jano Cohen
  • Reviews

Megan Mazarick’s Searing Subversions

Jonathan Stein

"soapbox" explores the nature of the ‘performative self’ versus our interior lives.