REUNION

Reunion highlights the agency of Black joy and collective nostalgia. Our positionality as “bodies of culture,” a term coined by racialized trauma specialist Resmaa Menakem, frames the body for its local (individual) and global (collective) designation. This invites an investigation of how cross-generational interaction may be initiated through the visceral act of remembrance.

Cindy Ansah
Cindy Ansah is a dance artist, writer, actress and filmmaker playing, creating and collaborating in Mohkínstsis (Calgary). Recently completing her BFA in Dance from the University of Calgary and rounding out her undergraduate career with a minor in English, Cindy has had the opportunity to engage as a dynamic member of the dance community in Mohkinstsis, fulfilling her role as a Dance Artist with local companies such as Calgary Core Contemporaries, Casa De Naz, and Woezo Africa Music & Dance Theatre Inc., while partaking in site-specific dance research as an assistant to Dr. Melanie Kloetzel and more recently broadening her sensibilities in somatic dance practice with Marie France Forcier. Cindy’s recent choreography and film works have been presented in the IGNITE! Festival for Emerging Artists, Fluid Fest, DSW’s Quick + Dirty Festival, DanceWorks Moving Online Film Showcase and the MOVING BODY Festival. Her literary ambitions have enabled her written body of work to be featured in The Dance Current, Springboard Performance, Alberta Dance Alliance and the 4th iteration of Configurations in Motion: Performance Curation and Communities of Colour. In her newly adopted roles as Co-founder and Artistic Director of the emerging all-Black contemporary dance company, NAPPY Dance Collective, Cindy aims to create a fluidity between art and activism by devoting her creative capacities to empowering Black artistry and Black collectivity in all its breadth, depth and nuance.

Tiara Matusin
Mohkínstsis/Calgary-based dance artist and emerging choreographer, Tiara Matusin, is currently on a journey of rekindling her interest in performance art. Beginning her post secondary career in 2017 at University of Calgary as a Biological Science major, she quickly rediscovered her enduring love for creativity and enrolled in the BA Dance program the following year. Tiara sought to blend her skills in science and dance to develop her artistic expression. She additionally extends her artistic practice to visual arts; including, fashion styling, photography, and videography. Her overlapping skills lent themselves to her choreographic debut in Fluid Festival’s, 5 Minutes to Change the World Cabaret, where she collaborated on the dance film “Asphalt”. Tiara’s ability to think critically allows her to analyze movement uniquely, going beyond the depths of composition. Tiara believes in an environment of growth, culture, and excellence to meet personal and creative goals and she hopes to implement such a model to her collaborative voyage with the all-Black contemporary dance collective NAPPY Dance as Co-founder and Artistic Director.