UBW Announces a Third Cohort of Choreographic Fellowship Candidates
With support from the Ford Foundation, Urban Bush Women (UBW) has named a third Cohort of Choreographic Fellowship Candidates: Jenn Freeman | Po’Chop (Chicago, IL), Nia Love (New York, NY) and Kesha McKey (New Orleans, LA).
Beginning this month, these artists begin an 18-month program designed to strengthen their artistic capacity, raise the national visibility of their work and skill sets and expand their networks and available support.
“We are honored to be able to invest in these extraordinary artists, who I believe to be deeply invested in the radical Black imagination through experimentation with performance form and content. As we move into our third year of deeply attending to and caring for the visionary work of our cohort members, I am hopeful our collective storytelling capacities through dance are being rooted and strengthened in ways our history and future will benefit from.”
The UBW Choreographic Center Initiative (CCI) Fellowship Program is a two-year program aimed at supporting women and non-gender conforming choreographers of the African Diaspora and choreographers of color who have developed a clear artistic voice and point of view addressing particular issues of cultural narrative and history and are exploring multiple platforms of storytelling.
The Fellowship has been designed to support choreographers who have a developing body of work and are currently receiving some support through grants, residencies and presentations but need assistance to ensure the work and the works’ vision are more fully realized than would be possible without additional support.
The Fellowship supports the development of work dealing with complex narratives addressing race, history, cultural identity, ethnicity and pressing social issues. The Program is structured over two years and broken into two distinct phases; an 8-month planning process, followed by a year of Fellowship activity. The program includes direct financial support, one or more residencies, mentorship, writing and reflection, and a commitment to placing one’s choreographic process as the highest priority, examining questions of craft, clarity of vision and execution of ideas in a rigorous and granular way through a dramaturgical process.
2019-2020 Choreographic Fellows: Maria Bauman (NY), Hope Boykin (NY), Ananya Chatterjea অনন্যা চট্টোপাধ্যায় (MN), Stephanie McKee (LA), Ni’Ja Whitson (CA/NY)
2018-2019 Choreographic Fellows: Marjani Forté-Saunders (CA), Francesca Harper (NY), Marguerite Hemmings (NJ), Paloma McGregor (NY), Amara Tabor-Smith (CA)
Read more about the new Cohort of choreographers below. Feature articles will be released on each choreographer over the course of the next year.
Follow these links to read more about Urban Bush Women and the UBW Choreographic Center Initiative.
Jenn Freeman | Po’Chop, Photo Credit Candice Majors
Chicago-based artist Jenn Freeman | Po’Chop uses elements of dance, storytelling, and striptease to create performances and inspire students & collaborators across the country. Po’Chop has performed at the Brooklyn Museum in Brown Girls Burlesque’s Bodyspeak and headlined shows in New Orleans, Kansas City, Minneapolis & St. Louis. 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 is a muse for co-created experimental dance films such as Home | Here. Po’Chop was awarded as a 2017 3Arts Make A Wave Artist and was selected as a 2018 Chicago Dancemakers Lab Artist.
nia love, Photo Credit Orion Gordon
New York based choreographer nia love was most recently awarded the 2019 Gibney DiP Residence and the 2019 Gibney Presents Artist in Residence. nia love is a 2017 Bessie Award recipient for Outstanding Performer as part of the Skeleton Architecture ensemble. A two-time Fulbright Fellow, a recipient of the Brooklyn Arts Exchange/BAX Artist-in-Residence and recipient of Dance Theater Works’ Suitcase Fund Award. Her work has been presented at NYU Skirball, Danspace Project, Harlem Stage, Judson Church,New York Live Arts, NOLA Cultural Arts Center, MOCADA, PS122, Snug Harbor, and Gibney Dance, among others. Presently, the BAX co-Artistic Advisor and most recently NYLA’s Artistic Advisor to Fresh Tracks. love also serves as Assistant Professor at Queens College, Bard College, and The New School.
Kesha McKey, Photo Credit Mariana Sheppard
Kesha McKey is a New Orleans choreographer, educator and performing artist. She received her BS from Xavier University and her MFA in Dance Performance from UW-Milwaukee. Kesha is the Artistic Director of KM Dance Project. Her latest project Raw Fruit was awarded a 2019 NEFA National Dance Project Production Grant and she is a recipient of the 2018 & 19 Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans Southern Crossings Residency. Her recent performances include Urban Bush Women’s Hair and Other Stories and Junebug Production’s Gomela/to return: Movement of our Mother Tongue. Her choreography credits include Women in Dance, Dancing While Black, Roots Week and Peridance APAP. She is a UBW SLI faculty member and the Dance Department Chair at NOCCA.