Wednesday December 9, from 6:30-8:30 PM
A.I.R. Gallery (155 Plymouth St)
Join us for an evening of performance, literature, and conversation exploring the intersections of Caribbean identity, ancestral inheritance, and artistic practice. The program will begin with a sound-and movement-based performance by Dominica Greene, activating her solo exhibition, A Cathedral Inside followed by readings from Harnessing Our Gardens, a newly published collection of stories featuring Black femme movement artists by writer and artist Victoria Awkward. The evening will conclude with an intimate panel conversation between Awkward, Greene, and dance elder Charmaine Warren, exploring how Caribbean culture, familial legacy, and the lands we come from live within our bodies and find expression through our creative work.
To RSVP click here, space is limited. There will be a waitlist at the door; we will do our best to get everyone in.
Charmaine Warren is a performer, historian, consultant and dance writer. She began the online series “Black Dance Stories” in June 2020 as a platform for Black dance creatives during the Covid pandemic, and it has been her charge to support Black dance creatives for years. Warren has led programming at Montclair Dance Festival, Dance @ Wassaic Project, Harlem Stage, and DanceAfrica at BAM among many others; as a performer, she is a Bessie Award recipient (2017, 2021) and a 2026 Danspace “Rebel Angel” honoree. Charmaine was a member of the internationally-known, New York-based dance/theater company david rousseve/REALITY as well as Skeleton Architecture Collective, and she has recently performed with Monica Bill Barnes and Jasmine Hearn. Charmaine holds a PhD from Howard University and a Masters degree from CUNY and has taught at Hunter College, the Ailey School, Fordham University, Sarah Lawrence College, and more.
Victoria Lynn Awkward is a multidisciplinary creator, educator, producer, and the Director of VLA DANCE. She pursued her multiple interests at Goucher College and graduated with high honors in Dance, Visual Art and Secondary Education. As the Director of VLA DANCE she is currently directing projects: “For Nina” - a multidisciplinary show celebrating the lineage of Nina Simone, “In The Space Between” - a production where dance, textile, and audio brings audiences into a world of queer imagination, and “Harnessing our Gardens” - a book celebrating the stories of Black femme movement artists. Notably, Victoria is a Brother Thomas Fellow as well as a recipient of the Queer (Re)public Theater Offensive Residency. Additionally, Victoria is a producer of Performance and Live Art for MoMA.
Dominica Greene is an interdisciplinary conceptual artist whose creative outputs traverse the realms of dance, movement, theater, facilitation, and producing. A graduate of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (BFA 2016), Greene has developed a practice grounded in physical rigor, risk, duration, and the body as a conduit for energetic and ancestral knowledge. A mixed-race, Guyanese- American woman, Dominica is committed to dreaming up and worldbuilding alternative realities and more expansive futures with her BIPOC, immigrant, and LGBTQIA+ communities.
Greene’s work has been presented by the Carnegie Museum of Art, Guggenheim Museum, Center for Performance Research, ISSUE Project Room, Judson Memorial Church, Socrates Sculpture Park, and Triskelion Arts. She has received commissions from Danspace Project and the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, and recently participated in an exchange residency at Bergen Dansesenter in Norway.