Anna Banerjea is a recent graduate of Wake Forest University where she minored in Dance and performed with the school’s dance company for four years. She is now a graduate student at UVA, studying Spanish Literature. Dance has always been an important part of her life, so she is excited to have found such a welcoming dance community in her new home, Charlottesville, VA. In January she performed in “Under the Veil”, with Miki Liszt Dance Company and recently has started dancing with inFluxdance.
Judith Shatin’s music, called “highly inventive…hugely enjoyable and deeply involing, with a constant sense of surprise (Washington Post),builds compelling dramatic arcs. Shatin, who is William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor and Director of the Virginia Center for Computer Music at the University of Virginia, is a sonic explorer whose music spans chamber, choral, dance, electroacoustic, installation, multimedia and orchestral genres; it is widely performed abroad and at home. Shatin’s inspirations come from a cornucopia of the sounding world, informed by a rich tapestry of poetry, myth and story. A recipient of four National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, she has been honored with awards from the American Music Center, Meet the Composer, MetLife Creative Connections, the New Jersey State Arts Council and the Virginia Commission for the Arts. A two-year retrospective of her music in Shepherdstown, WV, sponsored by the Lila Wallace-Readers Digest Arts Partners Program, culminated in her folk oratorio, COAL, scored for Appalachian Ensemble, chorus and electronics. Commission highlights also include those from the Barcelona New Music Ensemble, Dutch Hexagon Ensemble, Kronos Quartet, Library of Congress and the National Symphony. CD’s devoted to Shatin’s music include Dreamtigers (Innova) and Piping the Earth (Capstone), and she is also represented on the Centaur, Neuma and Sonora labels. Twice a fellow at the Rockefeller Center in Bellagio, other residencies include Bramshaus (Germany), La Cité des Arts (France), Mishkan Amanim (Israel), and, in the US, the MacDowell Colony, Virginia Center for Creative Arts and Yaddo. Educated at Douglass College (AB), The Juilliard School (MM) and Princeton University (PhD), Shatin is in demand as a master teacher. She has taught at the Wellesley Composers Conference and served as BMI composer-in-residence at Vanderbilt University and as composer-in-residence for the Chamber Music Conference and Composers’ Forum of the East. For more information, visit www.judithshatin.com.
Richard Robinson is an award winning photographer and filmmaker based near Charlottesville, Virginia. His still photography work has appeared in numerous publications including Smithsonian, National Geographic Traveler, Time and The Washington Post Magazines; as well as in the Photography Annuals and Communication Arts. His first narrative film, “The Beekeepers,” will be screened at Sundance this January (2009). He is represented by Aperture Images.
Julia Diaco grew up outside of Chicago and received her BA in Dance and Journalism at the University of Iowa. Her dance professors at Iowa included Lan-lan King, Francoise Martinet, Alan Sener, Beth Corning, and David M. Berkey. She received full scholarships to attended summer intensive programs with David Parsons Dance Company, which led to performing dates with company member Gail Gilbert in New York City. After returning to Chicago she studied with Hubbard Street Dance, Giordano Dance. She performed and studied with the Joel Hall Dance Company. She returned to Iowa after marrying her husband Bobby and became the Promotions and Marketing Director for an equity theater company in Amana, Iowa. Since then most of Julia’s time has been spent happily following her husband’s career around the country and raising her three incredible children Angelo, Josephine and Michael. Her most recent move to Charlottesville has found Julia excited to be dancing and performing again.
Tanja London started dancing at the age of 22 exploring improvisation and New Dance concepts with Keriac. Later on she received her BA honors in Contemporary Dance from London Contemporary Dance School, University of Kent, UK in 2001. Since then, she has been freelancing in the UK, Germany and the US. Tanja has collaborated with musicians, visual artists and choreographers including Scott Wells during his skateboarder-dancer project. Since 2002, Tanja has also been performing her own choreography and co-founded an independent platform for improvisation in Düsseldorf, Germany. In 2004, she co-founded the choreographer collective EXakt in Germany. Most recently she was granted the Space Grant Award at Green Street Studios and was invited to show her work at the Cambridge Multicultural Center. Tanja has been collaborating with inFluxdance since last season and enjoys herself immensely! Best thing next to my husband Aaron who makes all of this possible!
william lorson is a recent transplant from DC. He is a dancer and artist with an MFA from Ohio University. He has worked with Ground Zero Dance, InFluxdance, Liz Lerman Dance Exchange, Miki Liszt Dance, and R Squared Dance. william also has 6 paintings hanging in the World Bank at 1818 H St in DC, goes by the name “ian” sometimes, and loves his Flickr account more than he can express.
Kristina Meshelski studied dance and philosophy as an undergraduate at UCLA. During that time she performed in Collage Dance Theatre’s Governing Bodies and Kristen Smiarowski’s The Last Big Event. Since moving to Charlottesville she has performed with Miki Liszt Dance Company and is excited to work with InFlux! She is currently pursuing her PhD in philosophy at the University of Virginia, and is Viceroy of the Institute for the Study of Art and Philosophy at UVa.
Autumn Proctor is currently teaching at the University of Virginia. She holds an M.F.A. in dance performance and choreography from New York University, Tisch School of the Arts.She received her B.F.A. in dance with a concentration in modern from Marymount Manhattan College. She most recently finished a year of teaching in the School of Theatre and Dance at East Carolina University. She has spent time studying abroad and has worked with various artists including: Bill Young, Cheryl Therion, Rodger Belman, Bridget L. Moore, Kyle Abraham, Merle Holloman, and Milton Myers. She has also performed works by Preljocaj, Pina Bausch, Merce Cunningham, Jose Limon, and others. She is currently teaching and choreographing for Ann Catherine Cross School of Dance and serving as an adjunct faculty member at Virginia Commonwealth University. She is also very excited to be currently working with Rose Pasquarello Beachamp as part of InFluxdance. Aside from teaching, Autumn is also co-director of we are artists, which is a newly established program that works to enahance the young artists experience in creating individual artistry. She is grateful for the gift of movement and for the ability to use her body as her living instrument in life and in art forms.
Blake Roeder
Diana Steinberg (dancer) can not remember a time when she was not dancing. After graduating from Brandeis University, she joined the Peace Corps and was sent to Haiti. In recent years, Diana’s dance has mostly focused on Afro-Brazilian and Haitian dance, performing and dancing with Isaura Olivera in her group IWA PELE, the Haitian group FANTEZI KREYOL, and performing her own choreography. This show is Diana’s first time performing since the birth of her daughter, Marley, who is now two. Glad to be back!
Rachael L. Shaw is a local choreographer and founding member of R Squared. For the past several years Rachael has been the Director of Operations of Miki Liszt Dance Company in Charlottesville, Virginia. She has produced and choreographed for many Miki Liszt Dance Company performances. She has also danced with Starr Foster Dance Project, Prospect Dance Group, Zen Monkey Project and Ground Zero Dance Company. This past summer, Rachael directed the aerial piece and performed in the firedance in Shentai, an arts carnival organized by local artists, dancers and actors.
Kelly Silliman studied ballet for ten years before falling in love
with modern dance at age fourteen, after which she promptly began her own company. She holds a BA in Theatre Arts from Stetson University, where she implemented and taught the modern dance program for the Academy of Dance in DeLand, FL. After college, Kelly moved to Boston, where she co-founded Royal Jelly, a performance ensemble for dancers, musicians, and artists. In 2000, she moved to Tucson, AZ, where she danced with NEW ARTiculations Dance Theatre. Since moving to central Virginia in 2004, Kelly has danced with Prospect Dance Group, performed in Wunderkammer and Shentai, and is currently working with inFluxdance and UpRooted Dance Theatre. Kelly and her husband own The Dance Barn, a new studio in Greene County, VA. They live on a farm with their three daughters and
many animals.
Lori Wilson studied Dance and Entrepreneurial Studies at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, PA. She graduated with a B.A. in 2005. After graduating, Lori moved to Orlando, FL to work for the entertainment department at Walt Disney World. Lori is now currently living in Charlottesville and has been a member of Miki Liszt Dance Company for the past year. She also performed in Charlottesville’s Shentai in June 2007. In addition to performing with inFluxdance this year, Lori will also be dancing with UpRooted Dance Theatre Company and R Squared.
Rye Zemelsky, NIC-A, is a nationally Certified ASL/English Interpreter. Currently she is a full time staff interpreter for Greenfield Community College’s Outdoor Leadership Program. Her experience in the performing arts began as a child and continued as a visiting student at Gallaudet University where she served as stage manager. She has been involved in the performing arts at Deaf conferences as well as her senior thesis of theatrical interpreter at Smith College. Rye worked at The Learning Center for the Deaf where she began collaborating with Alysia. This will be Rye’s 3rd season with inFluxdance where she is ASL consultant, interpreter, organizer, tutor and occasional stage manager. Her future plans include completing a timber framing apprenticeship this summer and creating a specialized Outdoor Leadership training program for Deaf students.