Creative Exchange Lab is back!
Introducing the Spring 2023 Artists
Portland's favorite artist residency is back for another round! Funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and supported by Taiwan's National Art and Culture Foundation, Creative Exchange Lab (CXL) invites artists from around the world to come work, learn, explore, and make connections in our city. CXL is a unique opportunity in that it highlights exchange and friendship in addition to offering the support of PICA's Artistic Directors and staff. The studio practices of this cohort range from choreography to performance to storytelling to writing and new media. So please join us in welcoming our spring artists!
Jenn Freeman/Po’ Chop
Allie Hankins
Anthony Hudson/Carla Rossi
Anchi Lin [Ciwas Tahos]
Malik Nashad Sharpe
Read on to learn more about each of the artists.
Jenn Freeman/Po’ Chop
Chicago-based burlesque artist Jenn Freeman also known as Po’Chop uses elements of dance, storytelling, and striptease to create performances and inspire students and collaborators across the country. Po’Chop is the creator and author of the blogzine, The Brown Pages and has performed at the Brooklyn Museum in Brown Girls Burlesque’s Bodyspeak, at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance for TedxChicago 2022 and headlined shows in New Orleans, Minneapolis, Denver, St. Louis, and New York. Po’Chop is a board member & cast member for Jeezy’s Juke Joint, an all Black burlesque revue. Po’Chop performs on Netflix’s Easy (Season 2), appears in music videos for songs by Jamila Woods and Mykele Deville, and creates and performs in experimental dance films such as LITANY. Jenn Freeman was recognized as a 2022 United States Artist Fellow; a 2022 Dance/USA Fellow; a 2021 Foundation of Contemporary Art Grant for Artist recipient, selected as a 2019-2020 Urban Bush Women Choreographic Fellow, and as a 2018 Chicago Dancemakers Lab Artist. Po’Chop has been voted among the top 50 Most Influential Burlesque Artists by 21st Century Magazine in 2022, 2021 & 2020 and was dancer in residence at Rebuild Foundation in 2020.
Allie Hankins
Allie Hankins is a dancer, performer, and performance maker currently working and residing on the unceded lands of the Multnomah, Cowlitz, Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, Clackamas, and many other tribes, also known as Portland, Oregon. She is an inaugural resident artist and current steward of FLOCK Dance Center, a studio and creative home to Portland’s experimental dance artists which was founded in 2013 by Tahni Holt. In 2014, Allie co-initiated Physical Education, a queer performance research cooperative/support group, with Lu Yim, keyon gaskin, and Takahiro Yamamoto. Physical Education hosts reading groups and lectures, curates festivals, and teaches workshops nationally. When not working on performances, Allie is learning American Sign Language and teaching aerobics.
Anthony Hudson / Carla Rossi
Anthony Hudson (Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, Siletz) is an artist and writer sometimes better known as Portland's premiere drag clown Carla Rossi. Together they host and program Queer Horror—the only LGBTQ horror film and performance series in the country—at the historic Hollywood Theatre. Anthony's performances have been featured at the New York Theatre Workshop, La Mama, PICA's TBA Festival, Portland and Seattle Art Museums, Portland Center Stage, and have toured internationally. Find out more at TheCarlaRossi.com.
Anchi Lin [Ciwas Tahos]
Anchi Lin [Ciwas Tahos] is a performance and new media artist of Taiwanese Indigenous Atayal and Hō-ló descent based in Taipei, Taiwan. Following a Bachelor of Fine Art in Visual Art at Simon Fraser University (Canada), Lin is currently undertaking a Master of Fine Art in New Media Art at Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA). Through her practice and interest in language, identity, gender, and the environment, Lin seeks out new forms of understanding beyond the hetero-patriarchal status quo, using video, performance, cyberspace, and installation.
Malik Nashad Sharpe
Malik Nashad Sharpe, also known as Marikiscrycrycry, is a successful choreographer and movement director known for his provocative and formally engaging performance works that address themes of violence, alienation, horror, melancholia, and the horizon. He holds a BA in Experimental Dance with highest honors from Williams College and a certificate in Contemporary Dance from Trinity Laban Conservatoire for Music and Dance, where he won the Simone Michele Prize for Outstanding Choreography. He has received commissions and shown his work at venues and festivals across the UK, Europe, and Canada, and is currently an Associate Artist at The Place and a studio resident of Somerset House Studios. He has held artistic residencies at Sadlers Wells, Barbican, Performance Situation Room, Dance4, Duckie, and Tate Modern. In 2019, he was named a Rising Star in Dance by Attitude Magazine and in 2022, he was featured on the Forbes 30 under 30 list for his unique and pervasive choreographic achievements. He currently lives in London and is a guest professor in dance and performance at the Stockholm University of Arts in Sweden.