Nora Alami is an experimental dance artist and doctoral candidate in Performance Studies at Northwestern. Dance is her tool for conducting research, building community, and organizing politically. She’s been honored to collaborate with Jasmine Hearn since 2021. Her choreography has been presented at Nublu Classic, UNDOXX Festival, New York Arab Festival at LaMaMa Moves!, Danspace’s DraftWork, Triskelion Arts, Center for Performance Research, and Movement Research at Judson Church. She is a 2026 Trisk Fellow with Kimiko Tanabe, 2026 ImPulsTanz ATLAS choreographer, 2025 danceWEB Scholar, 2024 MANCC Forward Dialogues Artist, and 2023-2024 CUNY Dance Initiative Artist. She has been supported by residencies at New York Live Arts Fresh Tracks, JACK, BRIClab: Performing Arts, The Petronio Center, and Houston Metropolitan Dance Center.

Soleil Collyear is an artist that works primarily with movement. Their work explores site-specificity, duration, the texture of language, and the daily interrogation of our relationship to the natural and the man-made. They are deeply invested in deconstructing the hyper-normative nature of categorization—challenging the labels we assign and are assigned as human beings.

Melanie George is an educator, choreographer, scholar, and dramaturg, specializing in rooted jazz dance and adjacent dance forms, and contemporary dance-theatre. Named one of Dance Magazine’s 30 over 30, she is the former Associate Curator at Jacobs Pillow, and newly appointed Chair and Producing Artistic Director of the Dance Department at Marymount Manhattan College. Melanie is currently engaged in ongoing artistic collaborations with Shamel Pitts, Helené Simoneau, DanceLab NY, and Jasmine Hearn. 

Dominica Greene is a movement-based conceptual artist, dancer, and facilitator based in Brooklyn, New York. She values dance as one of the purest forms of expression, utilizing it as an energetic entity capable of affecting real and palpable change. Her company and freelance experience is extensive, having collaborated with, performed, and toured the work of many notable artists. As a Queer, mixed-race, Guyanese-American woman, she is committed to dreaming up and worldbuilding alternative realities and more expansive futures with her BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ communities. She has had the honor of collaborating with Jasmine Hearn for 10 years! A blessing!

Harrison Guy (he/him) is a nationally recognized choreographer whose work merges dance, memory, and social transformation. As the founder and artistic director of Houston’s Urban Souls Dance Company (est. 2004), he has spent over two decades creating bold, movement-driven works that center Black identity, cultural legacy, and liberation. He is also the founder of Black Arts Movement Houston, the African American Dance Festival, and Brave Bodies. A 2019 Dance/USA Fellow and 2026 Dance Source Houston Artistic Honoree, Guy’s choreography has been presented on prestigious stages nationwide. His acclaimed work Can We Know the Sound of Forgiveness premiered at Rice University’s Opera Hall with dancers from Houston Ballet Academy and was later performed at Carnegie Hall with students from The Ailey School. He also co-choreographed Plumshuga: The Rise of Lauren Anderson alongside Stanton Welch, Artistic Director of Houston Ballet, honoring the groundbreaking ballerina’s legacy.Rooted in truth and radical inclusion, Guy creates space for Black dancers to thrive. His work reclaims dance as a force for cultural preservation, fearless truth telling, and transformative collective power.

Byronné J. Hearn is a nurse manager, registered nurse, community leader, organizer, and the founder of Pecan Palate Pleasures, LLC. Born and raised in Houston, TX, she has worked as a school nurse between the campuses at Southland Elementary and the Gregory Elementary School (1978 – 1980).  During her training,  Byronné developed a love for pediatric and neonatal nursing. In her early professional years, she worked in the special care units at Texas Children’s Hospital, Hermann Hospital, Ben Taub Hospital and Jefferson Davis Hospital in Houston TX. Born of the love and resourcefulness of her paternal Grandmother Orange Mae, Byronné learned the art of making pecan candy. Orange Mae taught her to use a few kitchen ingredients and a huge helping of love to make this legendary Louisiana favorite sweet treat!  Influenced by her creative and ingenious maternal grandmother “Minnie”,  Byronné expanded a home tradition into a tastefully delicious candy business, Pecan Palate Pleasures. Byronné’s pecan pralines can be purchased at any Frenchy’s Chicken location in Houston, TX. 

Jasmine Hearn, born and raised on occupied Akokisa lands (Houston, TX), is an interdisciplinary artist, teacher, doula, performer, and organizer. Jasmine, recently named one of Dance Magazine’s “25 to Watch” (2025), is a recipient of a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award (2023), a Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Leon Polsky Rome Prize in Design with Athena Kokoronis of DPA (2023), a Jerome Foundation Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship Award (2019), and two NY Dance and Performance Bessie Awards for Outstanding Performer (2021, 2017* with the cast of skeleton architecture). Jasmine has collaborated with Dream the Combine, Bill T. Jones, Saul Williams, Solange Knowles, Alisha B. Wormsley, Vanessa German, Okwui Okpokwasili, will rawls, Marjani Forté-Saunders, Tsedaye Makonnen, Holly Bass, Bebe Miller, and with dance companies, Sandra Organ Dance Company, Urban Bush Women, David Dorfman Dance, Staycee Pearl dance project, and Dance Alloy Theater performing choreographic works at the Metropolitan Museum, Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York Live Arts, Guggenheim Museum, Getty Center, Venice Biennale, Ford Foundation, Kelly Strayhorn Theater, Danspace Project, and the Hobby Center for Performing Arts. Jasmine is currently leading an archive and performance project, Memory Fleet, which has been awarded a Creative Capital Award (2022), a Creation Fund Award from National Performance Network (2022), and a National Dance Production Grant from New England Foundation of the Arts (2023). With its premiere Houston, TX as part of DiverseWorks Spring 2024 performance season, Memory Fleet continues to deepen.

Jenna Hearn, a multidiscipline practicing Physical Therapist with a focus on restoring function and independence to patients so that they manage their lives safely and according to their own desire. Jenna studied Health Sciences at Howard University, earning her Bachelor’s degree and completed her Doctorate of Physical Therapy at the University of Miami, receiving the Clinical Excellence Award in 2010. A native of Houston, Texas, Hearn loves traveling to visit family and friends, with New Orleans being one of her favorite destinations. “I’m a true southern girl, happy with good food and good company,” she says. Jenna is the phenomenal mother of her amazing 10 year old daughter, Jackson Wynn, and she is Jasmine’s older sister.

Hayden Hubner is a choreographer, performer, photographer, archivist and co-founder of international dance-theater collective Dogs Eat Wind based between Nashville, Tennessee and Rome, Italy. Their work places value in personal history, emotional inquiry, and distraction to explore “big” subjects – Love, War, Death, etc. – as much as the “small” instances and images – drying your hands, tripping over cracks, little bits of fun – in some way, like a grocery list which does not emphasize the need for eggs over the need for love. Hayden’s debut stage work entitled “help up, help down” premiered in Nashville in March 2024 and has since been invited to stages such as Kindling Arts Festival (Nashville, Tennessee), Alter Ego Festival (Sofia, Bulgaria), and at the Accademia dell’Arte (Arezzo, Italy) earning two international travel grants from the Foundation of Contemporary Arts (USA) and MOVIN’UP PERFORMING ARTS SESSIONE 2023/2024 (Italy).

Kiki Lucas (Chair of Commercial Dance & Program Director, Jazz) is currently serving as the chair of commercial dance and an associate professor of dance here at Point Park University. She obtained her MFA from Montclair State University. Kiki specializes in jazz technique, contemporary partnering, and entrepreneurship in the arts, as well as dance composition. With a strong foundation as an alumna of PPU, Kiki has been a faculty member of the Point Park International Summer Dance faculty since 2002. Her extensive professional experience includes serving as the resident choreographer and company member of dance companies such as Met Dance Co. in Houston, TX, and Mosaic Dance Project in Miami, FL. Kiki’s exceptional choreography has been showcased at prestigious venues, including Jacob’s Pillow Inside/Out Stage, The Kennedy Center, Met Dance Co., Wright State University, Western Michigan University, Hawaii Pacific University, San Diego State University and Dreyfoos School for the Arts, and has premiered numerous works, as well as two musicals at the Pittsburgh Playhouse. Not limited to the U.S., Kiki has also made a significant impact on the international dance scene, sharing her expertise through teaching engagements in Argentina, Colombia, Costa Rica, Panama, Uruguay and Mexico. Kiki continues to pursue goals and spread her passion for dance as a member of the faculty for the Universal Ballet Competition, Shake the Ground and Chu This Perspectives, traveling extensively to educate aspiring dancers around the world.

Bebe Miller‘s vision of dance resides in her faith in the moving body as a record of thought, experience, and beauty. Her aesthetic relies on the interplay of a work’s idea, its physicality, and the contributions of Bebe Miller Company members to fashion its singular voice. Seeking to expand the language of dance, BMC’s creative work encompasses choreography, writing, film, video and digital media. Archival projects aim to share its creative practice, including two ebooks: Dance Fort: A History and How Dancing is Built: The Making of In A Rhythm. BMC also convenes gatherings to facilitate inter-artist dialogue and exchange, such as Vault (vault-project.org). Bebe formed Bebe Miller Company in 1985 to pursue her interest in finding a physical language for the human condition. Since then, she has created more than 50 dance works for BMC that have been performed worldwide. BMC has been commissioned and presented by leading venues including 651 ARTS, BAM Next Wave, DTW, Jacob’s Pillow, Joyce Theater, PICA, REDCAT, Walker Art Center and Wexner Center for the Arts. Her choreography has been performed by A.I.M by Kyle Abraham, Dayton Contemporary Dance Company, Oregon Ballet Theater, Boston Ballet, Philadanco, Repertory Dance Theater, the UK’s Phoenix Dance Company, PACT Dance Company of Johannesburg, South Africa, and others. Named a Master of African American Choreography by the Kennedy Center in 2005, Bebe is an inaugural Doris Duke Artist Award recipient, a Movement Research honoree, and a Danspace Project Gala honoree. She has received four New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” awards, the David R. White Award from New York Live Arts, and honorary doctorates from Ursinus College and Franklin & Marshall College. Bebe is a Distinguished Professor Emerita in The Ohio State University’s Department of Dance and is currently living in a forest on Vashon Island, WA.

Angie Pittman is a New York-based, two-time “Bessie” award-winning multidisciplinary performance artist whose work uses dance, text, and sound. Their work has been shown at The Kitchen, Gibney Dance, BAAD!, Movement Research at Judson Church, Triskelion Arts, STooPS, The Domestic Performance Agency, The KnockDown Center, The Invisible Dog(Catch 73), The Chocolate Factory Theater, Danspace Project, Roulette, Brooklyn Academy of Music, and Krannert Center for the Performing Arts. As a dancer, they have danced in works by Larissa Valez-Jackson, MBDance, Tere O’Connor, Anna Sperber, Donna Uchizono Company, Ralph Lemon and many others. They are currently honored to be dancing in the work of Cynthia Oliver Dance Theatre and Jasmine Hearn.

Pamela Pietro – an Independent Artist and Educator, Chair and Full Professor at NYU Tisch Department of Dance. She has performed with Monica Bill Barnes, bopi’s black sheep/dances, Michael Foley, Jasmine Hearn, Gerri Houlihan, Joanna Kotze, Tendayi Kuumba, Annie B Parson, Jennifer Nugent, and Donna Uchizono. Her choreography has been presented: Danspace’s Food for Thought and Draftworks, Brooklyn Arts Exchange; Fridays at Noon 92 nd St Y and The Ice House in Phoenix. Internationally: Panama City; Singapore, ASWARA Dance in Malaysia, Dance RoundTable in Taipai, The New Beijing Dance Festival, the JD Festival in Korea, Ackerstadt Palast and Lake Studio, Berlin, Germany and Šibenik dance festival, Croatia.

Kendra Portier is a dance artist—choreographer, performer, and educator. Originally from Ohio, she has taught and performed around the world, from San Diego to Salzburg and Dushanbe to Athens. Her choreographic work has been presented internationally and continues through collaborative, project-based research, often engaging color, transdisciplinary practices, and ecological concerns. Portier is the Maya Brin Endowed Professor in Dance and an associate professor at the University of Maryland, College Park. Currently, she is performing with Jasmine Hearn Collaborates and with Cynthia Oliver/COCo Dance. www.kendraportier.com

Myssi Robinson is a Bessie award-winning performer, multi-disciplinary maker and activated caregiver rooting on Powhatan lands / Richmond, VA. She has interpreted many dances and dances through many interpretations. Her practice quilts together imaginative archiving, mixed-media marking / design, ritual curiosity and her own improvising body. Memory flows through photography / words / responsive visual art / video poetry / care instinct into material altars that uplift arrival, embodiment and spirit sight. Intuition and empathy play with maximalist instinct to give life to what comes. Gratitude to Carolyn, Darrin and all that is unseen for her life and the protections to create freely within it. 

Nica Ross is an artist, educator, and cultural producer based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Through humor and play, their research develops social machines: participatory, technology-mediated systems that generate ephemeral social phenomena through interaction and performance. Nica holds a B.A. in Cinema from San Francisco State University and an M.F.A. in Advanced Photographic Study from The International Center of Photography-Bard College program. Nica has worked in a wide array of expanded media, theater and event production on both commercial and artistic projects. They have worked with 3-Legged Dog Media & Theater Group, The Joshua Light Show along with many individual artists. Presently they are Director of the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry and Associate Professor of Video and Media Design in Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Drama.

Jo Stewart (they/them) is a poet, educator, and theater maker.  

jhon r. stronks (she/they/he) jhon r. stronks is a queer identifying gender non conforming singer and dancer. Often their dancing is a mending practice in pursuit of expansion and evolution, while their singing carries through a mourning call in search of recognition, and reconciliation. Through their voice and movement emerges a genderqueer expression that remembers lost existences and imagines new trajectories toward the home and rest they are chasing after.  

Ashley Teamer is a visual artist whose multimedia practice engages with the body, nature, space, and time. She combines sound with collage, painting, and sculpture to transform interior and exterior spaces. Teamer has presented solo exhibitions at WINNIE (New York, NY), Siena Heights University (Adrian, MI), and 4th Ward Project Space (Chicago, IL). Her work has appeared in group exhibitions at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Museum of Contemporary Art Denver, and the Pérez Art Museum. From 2019 to 2023, she was Dean at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Ashley received her MFA in Painting & Printmaking from Yale University in 2022 and currently serves as an Assistant Professor of Painting and Drawing at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Ashley splits her time between New Orleans, LA, and Brooklyn, NY.

Charmaine Warren is a performer, historian, consultant and dance writer. She began the online series “Black Dance Stories” in June 2020 as a platform for Black dance creatives during the Covid pandemic. She is the founder/producer and artistic director for “Dance on the Lawn:” Montclair’s Dance Festival, was a co-curator for Harlem Stage’s dance series, EMoves, and lead curator for Dance @ Wassaic Project Festival. In 2019 Charmaine became the Producer of DanceAfrica at BAM.  Charmaine is a 2026 Danspace Project “Rebel Angel,” a 2021 Bessie “Angel” Awardee, and in 2017 as a member of Skeleton Architecture Collective,” a Bessie for “Outstanding Performance.” She writes on dance for The New York Amsterdam News, and over the years The New York Times, Dance Magazine and other print media. She danced with david rousseve/REALITY, recently with Monica Bill Barnes, and now Jasmine Hearn.

Tara Aisha Willis is a dance artist, writer, dramaturg, and curator based in Chicago and Troy, NY. She studies Black living and experimentation in dance, performance, and their archives. Currently Curator of Dance & Theater at EMPAC, she’s previously held positions at Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, University of Chicago, and Movement Research where she founded the Artists of Color Council. Part of the “Bessie” Award-winning Skeleton Architecture, she’s performed for Will Rawls, Yanira Castro, Anna Sperber, Kim Brandt, devynn emory, and Paulina Olowska among others, and collaborated with Damon Locks, Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste, Anna Martine Whitehead, Zachary Nicol, Anna Adams Stark, jess pretty, and Jasmine Hearn. She earned a Ph.D. in Performance Studies at NYU and held research fellowships with the Getty Research Institute, NYPL for the Performing Arts, University of Indiana-Bloomington, University of London, and Jacob’s Pillow. Published writings include liquid blackness, Getty Research Institute, CARA, Center for Book Arts, The Black Scholar, Women & Performance, MRPJ, Brooklyn Rail, and soon University of Illinois. She is co-editor/author of the art books Marking the Occasion (Wendy’s Subway, 2021), and forthcoming: in the horizontal plane: taisha paggett performance works (Soberscove Press, 2026) and Ephemeral Organ (EMPAC/Wendy’s Subway, 2026).