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Sofia Engelman + Em Papineau are life partners, educators, and choreographic collaborators living in Lenapehoking // Brooklyn, NY. They are compulsive improvisers. Their works, which contain both set and improvised material, always leave space for deliberate tangents and active choice-making throughout. In performance, transparency of intent, structure, and method are honored through conversation with tech personnel, moments left in-process, and a practice of “unsilencing” which undermines the formality of performance by mobilizing the voice and instigating in-the-moment communication, boundary-setting, and need-stating.
Sofia + Em's first collaborative project was presented at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts while they were students at Smith College. Since then, they have held choreographic residencies at The Living Room, Ponderosa, The Dance Complex, MOtiVE Brooklyn, The Croft, Mana Contemporary, Sky Hill Farm Studio, The Floor on Atlantic, College of the Atalantic, and School for Contemporary Dance & Thought to develop works in their INSTANT SAVIORSseries and their 2022 project, GRIEF CAROUSEL, a collaboration with Albert Mathias. In addition to presenting their work at these residency spaces, the pair have performed at festivals including FRESH Festival, EstroGenius Festival, AS220's Providence Movement Festival, Queer Spectra, Post/Future Performance Festival, and Dancing Queerly Boston, as well as other spaces they love dearly such as Judson Church, Green Street Studios, BAAD!, Triskelion Arts, and freeskewl. Their work has been supported by NEFA, NYFA, FCA, and Northampton Arts Council and their individual performance credits include projects by Kathleen Hermesdorf, David Appel, Michael Figueroa, Tyler Rai, Claudia-Lynn Rightmire, Simon Thomas-Train, and Alice Gosti. They founded and directed freeskewl (now skewl), a platform for dance, discussion, education, and reparations during the COVID pandemic (2020-2022). |
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