Join Dance and Theatre Artists to talk about neurodiversity, disability, and accessibility in the arts.
Our next Creating Change Conversation is July 25 at 7pm ET
Moderated by Tara Moses!
Tara Moses (she/her) is a citizen of Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, director, playwright, Artistic Director of telatúlsa, Co-Artistic Director of Red Eagle Soaring, and a founding member of Groundwater Arts. She is a Cultural Capital Fellow withFirst Peoples Fund (2020); Invited Playwright with HBMG Foundation’s National WinterPlaywrights Retreat (2020); fellow with the Intercultural Leadership Institute (2018/19); theNative Storytellers winner with the Yale Indigenous Performing Arts Program (2019); an observer with the SDC Foundation (18/19); fellow with the Intercultural Leadership Institute (18/19); member of DirectorsLabChicago (2018); member of the Directors Lab at Lincoln Center (2017); Senior Artistic Director Fellow, Allen Lee Hughes Fellowship at Arena Stage (2016/17); recipient of the Thomas C. Fichandler Award (2016); Management Fellow, Allen Lee Hughes Fellowship at Arena Stage (2015/16); associate member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society; and Dramatists Guild member. She holds a B.A. in Theatre from the University of Tulsa and is attending Brown University/Trinity Rep as an M.F.A.Candidate in Directing in the fall of 2021. Twitter/Instagram: @taratomahawkwww.taramoses.com
Meet the Panelists:
Devin Hill (they/them) is a graduate from the University of Central Oklahoma with a B.F.A. in Dance Performance. Devin has had the opportunity of working with multiple artists such: as Christopher K. Morgan, William “Bill” Evans, Clarence Brooks, Brandon Fink, Hannah Baumgarden, Jeremy Duvall, Gregg Russell, Lachlan McCarthy, Kristin McQuaid, and Cat Cogliandro. They were also a member of the 2015-2016 award winning Kaleidoscope Dance Company. Since graduating from UCO, Devin has continued to further their knowledge of dance by performing, choreographing, and participating in intensives and workshops across the United States. In 2018, Devin had the honor of performing with Liz
Lerman’s Dance Exchange at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Mx. Hill currently resides in the D.C. metro area, where they perform in ReVision Dance Company and facilitate for Dance Exchange. Devin also serves as a member of the Mid Atlantic Accessibility Committee, Director of Accessibility and Inclusion for The Dance Safe Organization and an Educational Specialist for Dance Education Equity Association.
Petra Kuppers (she/her) is a disability culture activist and a community performance artist. She creates participatory community performance environments that think/feel into public space, tenderness, site-specific art, access and experimentation. Petra grounds herself in disability culture methods, and uses ecosomatics, performance, and speculative writing to engage audiences toward more socially just and enjoyable futures. She teaches at the University of Michigan, and is also an advisor on the low-residency MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts at Goddard College. Her third performance poetry collection, Gut Botany, was named one of the top ten US poetry books of 2020 by the New York Public Library, and she has published award-winning academic studies on community performance, disability culture, and arts and medical environments. Her latest book, Eco Soma: Pain and Joy in Speculative Performance Encounters, appeared in 2022 with the University of Minnesota Press (open access). Petra is the Artistic Director of The Olimpias, an international disability culture collective, and co-creates Turtle Disco, a somatic writing studio, with her wife, poet and dancer Stephanie Heit, from their home in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Personal Website: www.petrakuppers.org
Mx. Chelsey Morgan, CSE (they/them/xe/xem) is a Black, Afro-Latinx, Queer and Neuroexpansive sexuality & justice educator, cultural competency specialist, and intimacy director & coordinator. Their work specializes in topics under the umbrella of BDSM & Kink, LGBTQ+ intimacy, non-monogamy, trauma responsiveness and social justice and is guided by the intersectional, disability justice and transformative justice frameworks developed by black women and black trans scholars who have come before xem.
Chels is an AASECT Certified Sexuality Educator (CSE) as well as a Certified Holistic Sexuality Educator (CHSE) via the Institute for Sexuality Education and Enlightenment (ISEE) and is also certified by the ANTE UP! Virtual Freedom Professional Development School for Justice Workers in the history, implementation, and troubleshooting of various justice frameworks related to the sexuality field. In service of their greater goal to curate trauma-responsive performance and theatrical spaces, they have gained a wealth of training in psychological & physical responses to trauma as well as in the processing of emotional information. They have used this training to develop curricula and praxis for fostering greater inclusivity for the global majority members of their community and have taught courses for multiple intimacy organizations including Intimacy Coordinators of Color and the National Society of Intimacy Professionals.
As a creative, they strive to use their background and knowledge to tell stories of historically dehumanized communities that represent global majority communities in their rawness, in their vulnerability, in their strength and in their pride. If you’d like to learn more about Chelsey, please visit their website at www.mxcmorgan.com or follow them on Instagram at MxCMorgan.
Event is PWFF. Suggested ticket is $10-20.
ASL may be requested by July 5. Email us to request.