ACCESSIBILITY
ASL interpretation and CART captioning will be provided
HOW AND WHERE TO WATCH
Gerard Minaya, Jermone Donte Beacham, Nikolai McKenzie, and Sanchel Brown with Jasmine Elizabeth Johnson
Panel Discussion: Re-Sette the Stage: Choices, Circulations, and Stagings
Co-presented with On the Boards and REDCAT.
Conceived by Jamarsa Peters in partnership with Jermone Donte Beacham and jumatatu m. poe.
DESCRIPTION
Re-Sette the Stage brings together members of the Let ‘im Move You (L’MY) project with members from the Meet Me On Da Floor community in an exploration of the vastness of the Black queer majorette dance community. Let ‘im Move You is the name of a series of performance and visual art projects led by jumatatu m. poe and Jermone Donte Beacham that holds the Black femme and Black queer innovations of J-Sette at its center to explore team mentality, the complexities of rhythm, and the communicability of delight. Meet Me On Da Floor is a community group dedicated to assembling the many squads of J-Setters into a national unity to organize social and competitive events together, to spearhead leadership activities that engage the youth within the community, and to create and uphold standards for the J-Sette art form.
This discussion focuses on the Let ‘im Move You (L’MY) community, paying special attention to questions around collaboration. Panelists will explore how they've worked with local performers in tour locations, what they've learned from location changes, and various challenges that have emerged while migrating J-Sette outside of its original contexts.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Gerard has worked for BAAD! Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance, and danced for jumatatu m. poe & Donte Beacham’s “Let ‘Im Move You: This Is A Formation”, Ballet Hispanico’s BHdos, and Baker + Tarpaga Dance Project, to name a few.
Gerard Minaya (all pronouns respectfully) born and raised in The Bronx, is a Dominican-American, first-generation, Queer and Gay Latina artist whose focus, as of late, has been in movement, healing, and storytelling. They obtained their BFA from University of the Arts, and since then have delved into performance and arts administration to different capacities. Gerard is currently, solely, a freelance dancer artist.
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Jasmine Elizabeth Johnson is a scholar-practitioner and Assistant Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Her work explores the politics of Black movement including dance, diasporic travel, and gentrification. Johnson’s work has been supported by the Ford Foundation, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the National Endowment for the Humanities, and elsewhere.
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Sanchel Brown is a mother/performer/choreographer/medicine woman originally from Baltimore, MD. She has worked professionally in commercial, concert, and theatre primarily in New York and Philadelphia. She obtained her B.F.A from Virginia Commonwealth University, and since then has continued her studies at L’Ecole De Sable in Senegal West Africa, with Rhapsody James in Los Angeles, and Rhythm One Acting with Ozzie Jones. She began her career as an apprentice with Urban Bush Women. Her performance career continued on with highlights such as World of Dance Philadelphia, The Kimmel Center's 2018 Jazz residency, Davido’s Coming to America Tour, Theatre Horizon's Black Nativity (Barrymore Win!), and Let 'Im Move You: This is a Formation (National Tour). Her choreography highlights include Theatre Horizon's "The Color Purple" Regional PREMIERE ( nominated for Outstanding Movement/Choreography) and Yale University Dramat's "Dreamgirls". Recently, she has shifted her focus into her self produced healing works including her hit dance play "Home To Homeland” and musical titled “Wheelz of Life”. Sanchel currently teaches her original “AfroClub “ dance class fusing Baltimore House and West African Dance Forms.
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jumatatu m. poe - I am a choreographer and performer based between Philadelphia, PA and Durham, NC who grew up dancing around the living room and at parties with my siblings and cousins. My early exposure to concert dance was through African dance and capoeira performances on California college campuses where my Pan-Africanist parents studied and worked, but I did not start “formal” dance training until college with Umfundalai, Kariamu Welsh’s contemporary African dance technique. My work continues to be influenced by various sources, including my foundations in those living rooms and parties, my early technical training in contemporary African dance, my continued study of contemporary dance and performance, my movement trainings with dancer and anatomist Irene Dowd around anatomy and proprioception, and my sociological research of and technical training in J-sette performance with Jermone Donte Beacham. Through my artistic work, I strive to engage in and further dialogues with Black queer folks, create lovingly agitating performance work that recognizes History as only one option for the contextualization of the present, and continue to imagine options for artists’ economic and emotional sustainability.
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Jermone Donte Beacham - Dancing has been in my blood since I can remember. It started off with hip hop dancing for my high school -- I began to recognize my skill and talent. After four years of that, I was introduced to the world of J-Sette by women. J-Sette historically refers to Jackson State University’s female drill team that began in the 1970s. They “created” the dance style, and thus far have made it a distinctive form of dance. I was interested in this type of dance, but not entirely until I saw a group of males performing it. At that point, I claimed the style for myself and perfected it on my body. Currently, I have my own J-Sette line, Mystic Force, and plan to increase our already considerable renown in this style of dance in our community, and eventually internationally. Previously, I served as co-captain of Dallas’ Texas Teasers. I have participated and competed in several events and competitions, including 2 SetteItOff video challenges, Atlanta Pride 2010, Tennessee Classics 2009, and Memphis Pride 2008. In 2015, I was named New Legendary by the Meet Me on the Dance Floor J-Sette council, and have gained many titles since then, such as Best Dancer and Most Entertaining. Since then my biggest artist work has been a collaborative co-choreographed performance with jumatatu m. poe. This work, the Let im' Move You series, has been awarded the 2019 Queer Art Prize, and nominated for the Bessies in 2020. Currently, I lead the renovated Texas Teasers queer male J-Sette team. Our mission is to provides opportunities and guidance in pursuing dance careers for our younger generation of queer male dancers and providing scholarships to two of those young folks per dance (majorette) season.
ABOUT TBA:21 INSTITUTE
TBA Institute is a series of free, public programs that connect artists and audiences through deep discussion and critical conversation and serve to illuminate the ideas and inquiries behind festival artists' projects. Through the Institute, artists share their processes of creating and collaborating; their forms of engagement with communities and publics; and the social, political, cultural, and aesthetic contexts and concerns surrounding their work. Through guest artist lectures, panels and dialogues with invited moderators, and interactive workshops, the TBA Institute offers a range of ways to engage more deeply with the festival and with each other.
Please note that some TBA Institute events will be virtual (streamed online), while others will be held in-person for a limited-capacity, masked audience/participant group in the PICA Pavilion (back lot of PICA). We know that not everyone is able to gather in place right now. As such, most in-person events will be recorded and made available and accessible online shortly thereafter. Some of these recorded videos will be captioned.
Please refer to the TBA Festival website for a full Institute schedule, specific information about each event, accessibility, and other details.
Please note that a few events will require pre-registration, with instructions provided on the event webpage.
All virtual events (streamed online) will be captioned via auto- or CART captioning.
Some virtual events and some live, in-person events will be ASL-interpreted. These will be noted on each event listing on the TBA website.
All of the above information regarding access will be updated as confirmed.