April Sellers
April Sellers is a choreographer with a desire to lift and celebrate ignored streams in society. She founded the April Sellers Dance Collective in 2002 to use dance to create new, more equitable futures, especially for the queer community. Using pop culture, politics and feminist histories, she infuses life’s extreme moments and human stories with dance craft, controlled bedlam and superb comedic chops. In 2021 she received the National Dance Project Production Grant for her current project, Rumble Strips. In 2017 she received the award “Artist of the Year” by City Pages for her performance, Animal Corridor. Her works have been commissioned by The Right Here Showcase, Candy Box Festival, Intermedia Arts, Southern Theater Hennepin Theater Trust and Red Eye Theater in Minneapolis and Dancing Queerly in Boston. Her artistic work has been supported with fellowships/grants from MN State Arts Board, Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, Ohio Partners for the Arts and McKnight. She received a Sage Award for Outstanding Performance for “House of Big Love”, created and performed with collaborator Judith Howard, site specific at a St Paul residence. She has curated performances for the Southern Theater, Bryant Lake Bowl, Hennepin Theater Trust, Gamut Gallery, and Link’s Hall, Chicago. Over the past decade, Sellers’ work has been recognized by invitations to several well-known artist residencies, including the Djerassi Resident Artists Program (Santa Cruz CA), Maggie Allessee Center for Choreography (Tallahassee FL) Tofte Lake Center (Ely MN) and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Thesis Residency, where she received her MFA in Dance.
Joshua Lorris
is a performer, creator and teacher based in Minneapolis. Joshua explores improvisation and creative process in performance. With the body as the primary source, his work navigates the layers of daily experience that humans carry moment to moment. Select performance credits include the work of Xu Jiali, Leigh Fondakowski, Wendell Beavers, Amanda Hamp, Jane Hawley, Bob Holman, Ami Dayan and Valerie Williams. Joshua’s creative foundation is Action Theater (Ruth Zaporah), Open Source Forms (Stephanie Skurra), the Six View Points (Wendell Beavers), Roy Hart Extended Voice (Ethie Friend), and Body Mind Centering (Erika Berland). In addition to degrees from Luther College (BA Theatre/Dance) and Naropa University (MFA Theatre), Joshua is a trained Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analyst and is a certified teacher of Open Source Forms, a practice developed and expanded from Skinner Releasing Technique.
José A. Luis
was born in Veracruz, Mexico and raised in Racine, Wisconsin. Having lived in Milwaukee, Chicago, and now Minneapolis, moving has been part of José’s identity. Considered a “late-dancer”, formal training began at UW-Milwaukee, where he graduated with a BFA in Dance. He performed and created works locally before moving to dance with REDance in Chicago. Collaborative pieces as an undergraduate and post-undergraduate saw their way to festivals, residencies, and progress showings during this time. Minneapolis now presents him as an empowered independent solo choreographer in his own pieces, while expanding new ventures, like teaching. He strives to no longer separate art from life through an introspective journey, demonstrated in his works. An evening length show lies on the horizon for José. For now he continues to stay open and available for all opportunities. For more visit www.jose.dance
Alys Ayumi Ogura
is a Twin Cities-based multidisciplinary performing artist described as “compelling” in the Star Tribune. Ogura’s movement training began with Mika Kurosawa, the godmother of Japanese contemporary dance. Besides creating her own works, Ogura works with local, national and international artists. She has performed her work at the Walker Art Center’s Choreographer’s Evening, 9 x 22 Dance Lab, BodyCartography Project and Hijack’s Future Interstates. Ogura has also worked with Emily Johnson/Catalyst, Hauser Dance, AXIS Dance Company, Kata Juhász, Pramila Vasudevan, Laurie Van Wieren, and others. Ogura gives back to her artistic community by serving on DanceMN’s steering committee.
Rhea Speights
is an artist and teacher, specializing in dance, performance, and video. Her work is driven by a desire to experiment with other possible worlds and is influenced by her experiences making art with Jennifer Monson, Jessie Young, Niall Jones, and numerous others. Elements of ballet, contemporary dance, and improvisation inform her movement practice. She has presented her work in backyards, galleries, and theatre space across the United States as well as in Colombia and New Zealand.
T Lavois Thiebaud
is a Houston based performer, poet, and multimedia artist whose work evolves from the poetic word. Their performances aim to connect and catalyze audiences to seek a more inclusive understanding of humanity and morality outside of dogmatic, capitalist, and patriarchal structures. In 2018 Thiebaud co-created a multimedia performance called Cell Lust | a body which premiered at the Contemporary Arts Museum of Houston. Evolving from a background in theater performance, T has been a practicing improviser for over ten years and completed the improv training program at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater in Los Angeles, CA.
Laura Selle Virtucio
has balanced a vibrant career in the Twin Cities dance community for 20 years. Laura celebrates the wealth of artists she has worked with over the years including Shapiro & Smith Dance where she serves as Artistic Associate/Performer, restaging the companies work across the nation; and her continued work with Chris Schlichting since 2012, gracing stages across the nation. She has performed with Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater, Zenon Dance Company and Black Label Movement. While with Zenon, she danced in works by Luciana Achugar, Faye Driscoll, Morgan Thorson and Danny Buraczeski to name a few. Laura holds a BFA in Dance from the University of MN, a 2007 McKnight Fellowship for Dancers and a MN Sage Award for Best Performer. She teaches dance at the St. Paul Conservatory for the Arts and the University of Minnesota.