Shared Evenings Curated by Alexis Convento

Alexis Convento presents two evenings of emerging women choreographers at The Club as part of La MaMa Moves 2017. Alexis Convento is a Filipino-American producer, administrator and manager working within contemporary dance and performance, and is founder and lead curator of the CURRENT SESSIONS, a platform for emerging movement-based artists; her creative direction has led to sold out houses, close artist relationships, and the cultivation of new audiences with an enduring interest in connecting the performing arts, culture, and community. Additional curation includes Center for Performance Research’s Fall Movement, SPRING/BREAK Art Show, and Gowanus Art + Production’s FIRST LOOK, among others. Alexis speaks about the women-identifying choreographers she intends to present at La MaMa Moves 2017 – and says: “There’s a sort of magic, a virtuosity that connects these women artists. Bold in effort, yet captivating in spirit, each presents a narrative that is truly intersectional, through an intertwining of social identity, cultural memory, and embodied history.” Her vision is to make space for women of color to tell their stories, to recognize the interconnections of race, gender, class, and sexuality, and to relate these choreographies to current sociopolitical issues.

Alexis is also Creative Producer at Imprint Projects, a branding and marketing agency, and has produced events at all scales at Gowanus Art + Production. Additional production management and coordination positions include Frieze New York, The Armory Show, and World Maker Faire. She is a 2015-17 Field Leadership Fund Arts Manager Fellow.

Alexis holds a BFA in Dance from Fordham University with the Ailey School. Alexis’ work seeks to activate new conversations between genres which strengthen the relationship between art production and community, doing so through her own practice as well as her commercial efforts. She welcomes inquiries from individuals and organizations whose work also seeks to connect art, culture and the public.

The CURRENT SESSIONS is a performing arts organization that develops and presents the work of emerging artists. Through the production of curated performances, residencies, artist-led laboratory sessions, and open discussions, the CURRENT SESSIONS acts as a center for creative research on contemporary dance and performance art. Our programs encourage a performing arts community that is innovative in thought, diverse in approach, and experimental in form.

Our mission is to cultivate high-caliber dance works by early to mid-career choreographers whose practice focuses on critical and aesthetic experimentation while demonstrating bold decision making and a honed sense of creative intuition. We aim to provide a place for movement-based practices to thrive in New York City, serving as a space for furthering contemporary choreographic and artistic expression.

Fana Fraser shows “A Coronation” which is about a woman is on psychedelic quest for pageantry, power, and survival. Banana republic, meet your queen to be.​​

Jessica Pretty presents “this work” – this work aka “i want” is rooted in desire. for more spaces, for more work, for more of less, for more dimensions, for more pockets, for more times… this work is rooted in a practice of getting lost, and unfound within, and without these current/past/future sociopolitical moments. begging the simple question: what are you doing?

Leslie Cuyjet’s “A Salient Theme” aims to document life-long questions of identity, confuse and disrupt conventional narratives, and demonstrate the angsty, explosive, sensitive, pioneering excellence of the black woman.

Maree ReMalia presents “Back Issue IV” – a mash up sourcing and synthesizing materials from four different dance works made over the past four years, in four different cities, with four different sets of collaborators. Each work emerged from the specific identities of each cast and their particular abilities and idiosyncrasies. This work is meant to be a dialogue between previously produced materials, and like a game of ‘telephone’, acts as a way for Lilly Cho and Maree ReMalia to meet and interpret the information over time, space, and identity.

Mersiha Mesihovic’s “BOSNIANBORN *SHE IS A REFUGEE STAR*” examines diasporic experience, identity, and the struggle for self-determination as a refugee and immigrant within the context of western society and culture. How do you legitimize your existence in the world? How do you share personal stories when they intersect with topics like genocide and fear? BOSNIANBORN is more than a performance work, it is an environment void of fear where all its participants, artists and audience members alike, become active in the promotion of education and healing through inclusion.

Veraalba Santa will choose a Puerto Rican poet’s biography, take it apart and transcribe it into movement in an attempt to capture and re-imagine the poet’s inner life, monologues and asides to the world.

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