can - I - Trust : A Literary / Dance Collaboration (IWP Fall Residency 2022)

With so much of the world embroiled in conflict, it may be that trust is our only way out. Trusting other people is a necessity for positive social interactions, cultural exchange, and economic development. It also helps us learn to be trustworthy ourselves. What are we willing and able to do in order to build or reestablish bonds of trust? The International Writing Program (IWP) writers have collaborated with the dance makers in the Department of Dance to create the performance that we present to you this evening of Saturday, October 15.

This event will take place at 8 PM in the Space Place Theater in North Hall (20 Davenport St, Iowa City). Attendance is free and no tickets are required.

Please stay with us after the performance for a brief Q/A session with the performers and writers.

EVENING PROGRAM

1. Absentee Cities 
Choreographer: Sean Thomas Boyt 
Poet: Nagae Yuki 
Music: MacBook Air, Deep 

2. El Delivery 
Choreographer: Kyle Ayers 
Poet: Judith Santopietro 
Music: Antonio Gomez 
Dancer: Brittlyn Taylor 

3. “Look here,” he said. “This is where all the birds of the world are born.” 
Writer/Poet: Carey Baraka 
Text: "Where Birds Are Born" by Carey Baraka 
Choreographer: Danielle Russo 
Performers & Collaborators: Featuring Katelyn Perez and Carey Baraka with Lovar Davis Kidd and Zoe Miller 
Music: Carey Baraka 
Synopsis: To take flight, or to simply let go? To attend to the present is to actively endure the past. As a study steeped in questions, not answers, we keep and keep moving; being in time, being on time, being with time, making time, being stuck in time, grasping and always missing at that which is incurably temperamental all at the same time. Just doing—nothing more—because that is it at this time. Speaking of which, I deeply regret being unable to be here tonight. Carey, Katelyn, Zoe, L.D. — thank you for playing, for attending to this moment.

4. Known/Unknown 
Choreographer/Performer: Todd Rhoades
Music: "Columns" by Michael Wall 
Narration: Krystyna Dąbrowska 
Writer: Krystyna Dąbrowska 
Synopsis: Inspired by the poem "Spirit of the Forest." We go along with our lives, sharing ourselves, our dreams, our lives, but do we know anyone very well?

5. My Pain Is Not Up For Debate 
Writer/Poet: Yahya Ashour 
Choreographer/Performer: Lovar Davis Kidd 
Lighting Designer: Lovar Davis Kidd 

6. One, Two, Hat 3  
Choreographer and music editing: Jaruam Xavier.  
Performer – co-creation: Cassidy Banwart.   
Writer: Joaquín Ortega – One, Two, Hat 3.   
Music: Stone castles moody-ambient cello 111674; Bragernesasen-18874; Cinematic bass-swell-c-60616.  
Synopsis: The mood is sitting by the sound of a Drum box. A simple heart beating, maybe. She tries to deal with betrayal, with the inevitability of a beautiful found, lost, found again, and lost one more time. A light bulb describes the infinity pattern. It could be an eight. Eight is the number also the happiest journey. The number eight is the space to be filled...  

PARTICIPANTS

IWP 2022 Fall Residency Writers

Yahya ASHOUR يحيى عاشور (fiction, poetry; Palestinian Territories) has authored a children’s book and, in 2018, a collection of poetry [You Are a Window, They Are Clouds]. His poems and award-winning stories have been anthologized and appeared in newspapers and magazines in Palestinian Territories and internationally. He has taught creative writing and literacy skills to both children and adults at various community organizations in Gaza. He participates through a grant from the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affair at the US Department of State.

Carey BARAKA (nonfiction; fiction; editor; Kenya) has had his nonfiction published in Foreign Policy, The Guardian Longreads, Johannesburg Review of Books, Serious Eats, Guernica and elsewhere; his fiction has appeared, among other places, in Slice Magazine, The Common, and Gay Magazine. His work has received support from The Pulitzer Centre for Global Reporting and the Silvers Foundation; he is at work on his first novel. A grant from the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi has made possible his participation.

Krystyna DĄBROWSKA (poet, essayist, translator; Poland) is the author of five poetry volumes, most recently Miasto z indu [City of Indium] (2022). The recipient of the Wisława Szymborska, the Kościelski and the Capital City of Warsaw literary awards, she has had her poems translated into twenty languages. In the US, they have appeared in Harper’s, Ploughshares, POETRY and elsewhere; in 2022, a poetry volume in English translation, Tideline, appeared from Zephyr Press. Dąmbrowska herself translates Louise Glück, Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, Charles Simic and many other Anglophone poets. The Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the US.S. Department of State has funded her residency.

NAGAE Yūki 永方佑樹 (poet, performance artist; Japan) received the 2012 Poetry and Thought Newcomer’s Award; her 2019 poetry collection Fuzai toshi [Absentee Cities] was awarded the Rekitei Prize. Her most recent project is GeoPossession, in which 3D audio recordings of writers reading from their work in specific locations around Tokyo are made available to listeners at those locations. She has performed at the Saint-Remi Museum in Reims, France, and across Japan, and is a lecturer at Nagoya University of the Arts. Her participation is made possible by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

Joaquín ORTEGA (playwright, essayist, poet, scholar; Venezuela) works across media and institutions. The author of a volume of poetry and of plays like “Lo escuche llorar en mi boca. Tríptico de Caracas” [I Heard Him Cry in My Mouth. A Caracas Triptych], he has long been a librettist for popular radio and TV comedy shows, and has also published La cultura del milenio: ensayos sobre creatividad [The Millennium Culture: Essays on Creativity]. He teaches at Universidad Central de Venezuela, in the School of Political and Administration Studies. His residency is made possible by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the US Department of State.

Judith SANTOPIETRO (poet, translator, editor, scholar; Mexico) has published the poem collections Palabras de Agua and Tiawanaku. Poemas de la Madre Coqa/ Tiawanaku. Poems from the Mother Coqa. Her poems appear in many anthologies, and her translations from the Spanish and the Nahuatl have received several awards. Between 2005 and 2016, she directed Iguanazul: literature on indigenous languages, a project to revitalize native languages through oral tradition, literature, and arts. Currently, she is working on narratives about enforced disappearances in Mexico. She participates courtesy the Paul and Hualing Engle Fund.

UI Department of Dance

Sean Thomas Boyt is a dancemaker, dancer, and dance advocate based out of Philadelphia. They have recently danced for The Naked Stark, Nora Gibson Contemporary Ballet, Vervet Dance, and Anne-Marie Mulgrew & Dancers Company and collaborated with percussionist Dr. Andy Thierauf as stb x at. Sean's choreography has been shown all over Philadelphia, New York City, Iowa City, and across the United States (Seattle, Omaha, Minneapolis, Chicago, Indianapolis, D.C., and Boston, among others). Learn more at STBDancing.com.

Kyle Ayers is a multidisciplinary body-based artist originally hailing from Champaign, Illinois. He holds a bachelor of arts degree in Acting from Illinois State University and is currently finishing his master of fine arts degree in Choreography at the University of Iowa. He is deeply committed to pedagogical practices and teaches both Modern and Jazz technique classes at the University. Earlier this year, he presented research at the 8th Annual Somatic Dance Conference and Performance Festival in Geneva, NY, and also at WGIcon, the official convention of Winter Guard International, in New Orleans. He has been privileged to receive teacher training from the Limón Dance Foundation and is currently exploring philosophies related to Limón technique in his thesis research.

Lovar Davis Kidd, known as L.D., is a multi-disciplinary performer, researcher, and choreographic artist. Kidd has taught and choreographed at several Studios and Universities throughout the US and is currently a second-year MFA student and teaching assistant at the University of Iowa.
L.D. is the proud father of two handsome boys, Myles and Kohen.

Jaruam Xavier is a Brazilian MFA candidate and graduate/teacher assistant at the University of Iowa. An experienced dancer, he performed in Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, China, Uruguay, the United States, and Brazil, among other countries. He has been working on fusion martial arts techniques and contemporary dance as a choreographer. Influenced by Brazilian culture, Capoeira and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu traits are visible in his works. Enthusiastic about improvisation, Jaruam researches the spontaneous response from an improvisation perspective. For him, the inputs from the surroundings are a rich source for generating communication by movements. He has been practicing yoga since 2014 to improve the mental process during dance improvisations and to enhance the contemporary dance class. He believes that practicing yoga supports a dancer in making better choices during an improvisation.

Todd Rhoades (second-year MFA Dance Choreography track and teaching assistant) has been a professional performer and choreographer for dance, theater, and opera across the US for over twenty years. He has taught dance, Pilates, and yoga for private studios, ballet academies, conservatories, and most recently The Theater School at DePaul University. He has also served as the private Pilates and yoga teacher for Cirque du Soliel’s touring company of Luzia. Todd, a storyteller through movement, is a member of The Director’s Lab Chicago, American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA), Actors Equity (AEA), and the Stage Directors and Choreographers (SDC) unions. 

As a choreographer, Danielle Russo (she/her) has been presented nationally at American Dance Festival, Detroit Institute of Arts, Jacob’s Pillow, and The Yard; and internationally in Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Mexico, Panama, South Korea, Spain, and Sweden. As a performer, she danced for The Metropolitan Opera for several seasons. As an educator, she has taught on faculty at NYU Tisch School of the Arts, SUNY Purchase, CUNY Queens College, and The Joffrey Ballet School. Currently, Russo is a Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of Iowa. She holds BFA in Dance and a BA in Anthropology from NYU Tisch School of the Arts, and an MFA in Dance from Hollins University/American Dance Festival where she attended on fellowship. For more information, please visit drpp.nyc.

IWP & UI Department of Dance Program Directors

Christopher Merrill
International Writing Program Director

Christopher Merrill has published seven collections of poetry, including Watch Fire, for which he received the Lavan Younger Poets Award from the Academy of American Poets; many edited volumes and translations; and six books of nonfiction, among them, Only the Nails Remain: Scenes from the Balkan Wars, Things of the Hidden God: Journey to the Holy Mountain, The Tree of the Doves: Ceremony, Expedition, War, and Self-Portrait with Dogwood. His writings have been translated into nearly forty languages; his journalism appears widely; his honors include a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the French government, numerous translation awards, and fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial and Ingram Merrill Foundations. As director of the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa since 2000, Merrill has conducted cultural diplomacy missions to more than fifty countries. He served on the U.S. National Commission for UNESCO from 2011-2018, and in April 2012 President Barack Obama appointed him to the National Council on the Humanities. www.christophermerrillbooks.com

Eloy Barragán – MFA - Hollins University

Associate Professor, Choreographer, Filmmaker, Founder and Director: International Iowa ScreenDance Festival, Co-Director: Iowa Dance Festival. Artistic Director Dance Gala 2022. Director,  can – I – Trust IWP and Dep of Dance Collaboration 2022. Board Member of the American College Dance Association – ACDA. Recipient of the choreographers’ fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Boise Arts Council, Lifetime Career Fellowship: Idaho Commission of the Arts. 2017 Artist Project Grant - Iowa Arts Council. Eloy’s choreography and films have been presented in Mexico, Alvin Ailey Studios Citigroup Theater, DiCapo Opera Theater NYC US, Cuba, Finland, France Conservatoire de Paris – Cité de la Musique, Teatro Nacional de Panamá, China and Bolshoi Theater Russia.  Performed with Joffrey II, Washington Ballet, Compañía Nacional de Danza México, Ballet Royal de Wallonie, Mainz Stattheater, Eugene Ballet and Ballet Idaho.

_

Note: The following performers appear in the header image on this page, listed from left to right: Emmalee Hallinan (in collaboration with Diana Del Angel); Katie Phelan (in collaboration with Muthi Nhlema and Josh Henderson); and M Denney (in collaboration with Dominika Słowik, Michael Landez, Juliet Remmers).