Afro-Diasporic Dances Workshop Series - Day 1

Beatrice Capote - Orisha Movement 

Beatrice Capote is a 2024-25 Mellon Resident with the Hemisphere Institute creating a new work, Radical Goddess”. She is renowned for creating CapotechniqueTM, a unique fusion of Afro-Cuban dance traditions with contemporary dance forms. Capote is in her seventh season with Tony-nominated choreographer Camille A. Brown’s dance company and is Associate professor of contemporary dance at Indiana University Bloomington. Capote’s recent work as Yoruba Consultant/Choreographer for the off-Broadway production “The Half God of Rainfall” at the New York Theatre Workshop was featured in The New York Times. 

Capote’s choreography incorporates contemporary and Afro-Cuban dance language and highlights Black Afro-Cuban stories that have been overlooked by history. Her solo works, including “Reyita: The Life of a Black Cuban Woman in the Twentieth Century” and “Yemaya: Rebirthing to Existence,” have been featured in prestigious festivals and venues such as the Battery Dance Festival, BAAD! ASS Women's Festival, and Contemporary Dance Series at Bryant Park. 

Capote choreographed for four-time Grammy award winner Angelique Kidjo on her newest musical “Yemandja!” She performed for Jazz at Lincoln Center with Grammy nominated and award winners Paquito D’Rivera, Wynton Marsalis, and the orchestra’s leader Mr. Elio VillaFranca. She choreographed a new work dedicated to Oshun at the Texas Women’s University introducing CapotechniqueTM. 

Capote earned an A.A. from University of North Carolina School of the Arts, and B.A. in dance education and M.F.A. in dance from Montclair State University. 

Carne Viva Dance Theatre (Chachi Pérez and Lasco) - Rhythm Recipes

Carne Viva Dance Theatre is a vibrant and flavorful collective based in Lenape Land and Miami, composed of artivists de aqui y de allá. They are committed to culture as liberation and use their bodies as an act of rebellion. The company creates intimate, erotic, and playful works that honor their collective stories and celebrate their identities. They merge their Afro-Cuban influences, social dance, and modern improvisational practices to cultivate a compelling kaleidoscope of rhythm, movement, and storytelling. Through dance, theatre, text, and original sounds, they aim to pull audiences into the next dimension, awakening them to new experiences.

Carne Viva has received the BIPOC New Work Tracks (2022) for the Cannonball Festival, AIR at Mascher Space Cooperative, and MOtiVE Brooklyn. The company was a guest performing artist at the Artistry In Rhythm Dance Conference at Miami Dade College (2022-2023) and are the first ever Leaps In Bounds company in residence at Miami Dade College. They have showcased their most recent work at the Perez Art Museum in Miami, FL, and Judson Memorial Church for Movement Research. Carne Viva was also presented at the Latinx Movement Festival in Washington, D.C., and Miami Dance Hub's "Miami Dances!" (2024). They are the 2024 MAP Fund grantees for their current project, Dame La Receta!

Their workshop will explore how everyday kitchen items, like pots and pans, become powerful instruments of resistance and protest, especially in Latin American cultures. Participants will learn about the "cacerolazo"—the act of banging pots and pans to express dissent—and its significance in movements for social and political change. Through rhythmic exercises, participants will use these items to create sound, embodying the collective spirit of protest. The workshop will also incorporate movement, allowing participants to physically express the energy of resistance. Ultimately, this experience will highlight how music, rhythm, and movement serve as constant sources of joy, unity, and cultural pride within the Latinx community, even in the most challenging times.

Jade Sotomayor - Puerto Rican Bomba

Jade Power-Sotomayor is a Cali-Rican educator, scholar and performer who works as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Theatre and Dance at UC San Diego. Her forthcoming monograph from NYU Press ¡Habla!: Speaking Bodies Dancing Our América theorizes the concept of "embodied code-switching" across distinct social dance spaces, examining how relationships between dancing and sounding indexes counter-histories rooted in Latinidad’s blackness that continue to challenge the violent afterlives of the colonial encounter. She has published in Centro Journal for Puerto Rican Studies, TDR, Theatre Journal, The Oxford Handbook of Theatre and Dance, Latino Studies Journal, Latin American Theatre Review, and Performance Matters. Her articles “Moving Borders and Dancing in Place: Son jarocho’s Speaking Bodies at the Fandango Fronterizo,” “Corporeal Sounding: Listening to Bomba Dance, Listening to puertorriqueñxs,” and “Un Llanto Colectivo: A PerformaProtesta” have been recognized with awards from the Dance Studies Association (DSA), American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR), Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE), and the American Theatre and Drama Society (ATDS). She is also a dramaturg and co-directs and performs with the San Diego-based group Bomba Liberté. She is currently developing a bomba-based work for young Boricua women in Oakland inspired by Taína cacique and poet Anacaona.

Colette Eloi - Haitian Folk Dance

Dr. Colette Marie Eloi is an accomplished folkloric dancer/singer, scholar, and arts administrator specializing in African and African Diaspora dance. She founded ELWAH Movement Dance and Research in 2005, engaging national and international audiences through performances, academic programming, and K-12 curricula that celebrate African-rooted dance traditions.  A master Haitian dancer and Vodou song archivist, Dr. Eloi has conducted extensive fieldwork in Haiti, the US, Africa, and Latin America. Her work bridges cultural dance practices and scholarship, drawing from her rich artist experience hailing from the Oakland and San Francisco Bay area.  Dr. Eloi earned her PhD in Critical Dance Studies from the University of California, Riverside. Her dissertation explores FESTAC ’77, the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture held in Lagos, Nigeria, emphasizing its significance as a Pan-African cultural and dance-critical event. Her innovative concepts, such as the "sovereign body" and "corporeal footnoting," redefine how African-rooted dances are analyzed in post-colonial contexts. She co-authored a chapter for the Anniversary Edition of The History of the African Diaspora by Cambridge University Press and holds a BA in International Relations - Development Studies from UC Berkeley.  A sought-after choreographer, singer and lecturer, Dr. Eloi has shared her work on stages around the world as well as at universities, arts institutions, and community rituals and gatherings. Her commitment to bridging academic and cultural spaces continues to illuminate the transformative power of African-rooted dance as a tool for social change.

This event is co-organized by the Center for Latin American Studies and the Department of Dance at The Ohio State University. This event is funded through the NRC Title VI Grant from the Department of Education.