SLC Performance Lab

ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program produce the SLC Performance Lab. During the year, visiting artists to the MFA Theatre Program's Performance Lab are interviewed after leading a workshop with the students. Performance Lab is one of the program's core components, where graduate students work with guest artists and develop performance experiments. Dacvd Neumann is interviewed by Sarah Pollock (SLC'26) and Rebecca Padrick (SLC'26). Produced by Sheridan Merrick (SLC'26). Edited by Amelia Munson (SLC'26) David Neumann’s work as a freelance choreographer, director and performer includes a wide range of projects and disciplines. Since 1999, Neumann has worked behind the scenes to craft plays, operas, films and multi-disciplinary performances. From avant-garde theater to blockbuster films, classic opera to new musicals, David’s diverse experience has given him a unique ability to articulate ideas through performers’ bodies. Neumann has many years of teaching experience working at Juilliard, NYU, Princeton and Yale and is currently a tenured professor in the Theatre Department at Sarah Lawrence College. He has received three Lucille Lortel Award nominations and one Fichandler for his work on Cabaret at Arena Stage. He is the Artistic Director of ‘Advanced Beginner Group’, a multi-disciplinary performance company, which has been awarded three Bessie Awards. He is a 2019 Lucille Lortel, Outer Critics Circle, and Tony Award nominee, as well as the recipient of the 2019 Chita Rivera Award for Choreography for his work on the Broadway musical, ‘Hadestown’. Recent and upcoming projects include the musical ‘Swept Away’ at Berkeley Rep, and choreography and coaching for ‘A Marriage Story’, starring Scarlett Johanssen and Adam Driver.

ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program produce the SLC Performance Lab. During the year, visiting artists to the MFA Theatre Program's Performance Lab are interviewed after leading a workshop with the students. Performance Lab is one of the program's core components, where graduate students work with guest artists and develop performance experiments. Nicki Miller is interviewed by Frank Barret (SLC'25) and produced by Julia Duffy (SLC'25) NICKI MILLER (she/her) is an interdisciplinary theatre maker, aerial artist, performer, writer, and movement educator interested in art and performance that ignites the imagination, troubles the intellect, and nourishes the body. Nicki creates “art medicine” through theatrical encounters that connect bodies, minds, and environments to one another at the intersection of science and mysticism. Collaboration and relationship are central to her practice and process. Rather than approaching work from a discipline-specific focus, interdisciplinary art and performance emerges through poetic relationships between her skills and interests in the arts, ceremony, ecology, and embodiment. Nicki has also worked as a specialist integrating aerial arts into the dramaturgy and staging of theatre, opera, and dance productions since 2010. She was co-founding artistic director of Only Child Aerial Theatre (with Kendall Rileigh 2012-2021). Residencies include Cirkus Cirkör (Sweden), the 2016/17 New Victory LabWorks Program, the Santa Barbara Floor to Air Festival, Toronto Circus Sessions, 5th Wall Studio, and The Hupstate Circus Residency, among others. She currently teaches Aerial Arts for Pace University’s Sands College of Performing Arts and throughout the Hudson Valley at NYC.

The SLC Performance Lab is produced by ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program. During the course, visiting artists to the MFA Theatre Program's Performance Lab are interviewed after leading a workshop with the students. Performance Lab is one of the core components of the program where graduate students work with guest artists and develop group-generated performance experiments. Zach Morris is interviewed by Aliya Hunter (SLC'23) and Jillian Jetton (SLC'23) Produced by Chisom Awachie (SLC'23) Zach Morris (Third Rail Projects Co-Artistic Director) is co-creator of the immersive theater hits Then She Fell, The Grand Paradise, Sweet & Lucky, and most recently Ghost Light at Lincoln Center Theater’s Claire Tow Theater. Zach's work includes site-specific performance, multimedia installation art and environments, and experiential performance. He is particularly interested in creating projects that place contemporary art and performance in non-traditional contexts. Zach has been honored with numerous awards, including two BESSIE awards, and was recently named as one of the 100 most influential people in Brooklyn culture by Brooklyn Magazine. His work has been presented nationally and internationally with the support of numerous grants, commissions, and residencies and he has had the pleasure of teaching, mentoring, and creating new platforms to support the work of artists both at home and abroad. Zach holds a BFA in Directing from Carnegie Mellon University. To learn more about Zach's and Third Rail Project's work, please check out their website at www.ThirdRailProjects.com

The SLC Performance Lab is produced by ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program. During the course, visiting artists to the MFA Theatre Program's Performance Lab are interviewed after leading a workshop with the students. Performance Lab is one of the core components of the program where graduate students work with guest artists and develop group-generated performance experiments. David Neumann and Marcella Murray are interviewed by Chisom Awachie (SLC 23) Marcella Murray is a New York-based theatre artist from Augusta, Georgia, Murray is a playwright, performer, collaborator, and puppeteer. Her work is heavily inspired by the observed ways in which people tend to segregate and reconnect. Her work tends to focus on themes of identity within a community and (hopefully) forward momentum in the face of trauma. Performances include The Slow Room, a piece directed by Annie Dorsen at Performance Space New York; a workshop of Ocean Filibuster, which was co-created by the team Pearl D’Amour (Lisa D’Amour and Katie Pearl) with composer Sxip Shirey at Abrons Arts Center; the work-in-progress, I Don’t Want to Interrupt You Guys, created in collaboration with Leonie Bell and Hyung Seok Jeon during RAP at Mabou Mines; New Mony, created by Maria Camia at Dixon Place; and Shoot Don’t Talk at St. Ann’s Warehouse/Puppet Lab, created by Andrew Murdock. Along with David Neumann, Murray recently co-created Distances Smaller Than This Are Not Confirmed (Obie Special Citation for Creation and Performance), which opened at Abrons Arts Center in January 2020. Murray is part of an artist collective called The Midwives. As artistic director of Advanced Beginner Group, Neumann’s original work has been presented in New York at PS 122, New York Live Arts, The Kitchen, Central Park Summerstage (in collaboration with John Giorno), Symphony Space (in collaboration with Laurie Anderson), Abrons Arts Center, The Chocolate Factory, and The Whitney. Advanced Beginner Group has also performed at the Walker Art Center, Jacob’s Pillow, MASS MoCA, American Dance Institute, and Carolina Performing Arts, among others. Neumann has been a featured dancer in the works of Adrienne Truscott, Susan Marshall, Jane Comfort, Big Dance Theater, Doug Varone, Doug Elkins Dance Company, and in two duets with Mikhail Baryshnikov. His choreography in the theatre includes The Antipodes at Signature Theatre, Futurity with Soho Rep and Ars Nova, An Octoroon at Soho Rep, Underground Railroad Game at Ars Nova, and directing Geoff Sobelle in The Object Lesson at BAM Fischer and New York Theatre Workshop. Neumann was choreographer on Hagoromo with Wendy Whelan and Jock Soto, Home at BAM Harvey, and Sibyl Kempson’s Let Us Now Praise Susan Sontag at Abrons Arts Center. His film work includes collaborations with Hal Hartley, I Am Legend with Will Smith, Marriage Story with Adam Driver and Scarlett Johanssen, and White Noise directed by Noah Baumbach. Neumann is the recipient of three New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” Awards (including Best Production in 2015 for I Understand Everything Better). The third installment of the Distances... trilogy, in collaboration with theatre artists Marcella Murray and Tei Blow, will be presented in New York in 2024. Neumann has also been nominated for Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Circle Critics awards for his choreography on Hadestown. He is also the recipient of a 2019 Chita Rivera Award for Outstanding Choreography of a Broadway Musical for Hadestown. Most recently, Neumann was choreographer on Swept Away, with music by the Avett Brothers at Berkeley Rep. Photo: Maria Baranova

The SLC Performance Lab is produced by ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program. During the course, visiting artists to the MFA Theatre Program's Grad Lab are interviewed after leading a workshop with the students. Grad Lab is one of the core components of the program where graduate students work with guest artists and develop group-generated performance experiments. Kaneza Schaal is a New York City based artist working in theater, opera, and film. Schaal was named a 2021 Guggenheim Fellow, and received a 2019 United States Artists Fellowship, SOROS Art Migration and Public Space Fellowship, Joyce Award, 2018 Ford Foundation Art For Justice Bearing Witness Award, 2017 MAP Fund Award, 2016 Creative Capital Award, and was an Aetna New Voices Fellow at Hartford Stage. Her project GO FORTH, premiered at Performance Space 122 and then showed at the Genocide Memorial Amphitheater in Kigali, Rwanda; Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans; Cairo International Contemporary Theater Festival in Egypt; and at her alma mater Wesleyan University, CT. Her work JACK & showed in BAM’s 2018 Next Wave Festival, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, and with its co-commissioners Walker Arts Center, REDCAT, On The Boards, Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center, and Portland Institute for Contemporary Art. Schaal’s piece CARTOGRAPHY premiered at The Kennedy Center and toured to The New Victory Theater, Abu Dhabi Arts Center and Playhouse Square, OH. Her dance work, MAZE, created with FLEXN NYC, premiered at The Shed. Most recently, she directed Triptych composed by Bryce Dessner with libretto by Korde Arrington Tuttle, which premiered at LA Philharmonic, The Power Center in Ann Arbor, MI, BAM Opera House and Holland Festival. Her newest original work KLII, was co-commissioned as part of the Eureka Commissions program by the Onassis Foundation and is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creation & Development Fund Project co-commissioned by Walker Art Center in partnership with Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, and REDCAT. Schaal will develop and direct a number of upcoming works including SPLIT TOOTH with Tanya Tagaq (Luminato Festival, Canada), HUSH ARBOR (The Opera) with Imani Uzuri (The Momentary, AZ) and BLUE at Michigan Opera Theater. Schaal’s work has also been supported by New England Foundation for The Arts, Baryshnikov Arts Center, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Nathan Cummings Foundation, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, FACE Foundation Contemporary Theater grant, Theater Communications Group, and a Princess Grace George C. Wolfe Award. Her work with The Wooster Group, Elevator Repair Service, Richard Maxwell/New York City Players, Claude Wampler, Jim Findlay, and Dean Moss has brought her to venues including Centre Pompidou, Royal Lyceum Theater Edinburgh, The Whitney Museum, and MoMA.

Will Frears is an award-winning theatre and film director. His New York credits include Misery (Broadway), Still Life (MCC), The Water’s Edge (Second Stage), Pen (Playwright’s Horizons), Terrorism (The New Group/Play Company), Rainbow Kiss (The Play Company), Where We’re Born (Rattlestick), God Hates the Irish (Rattlestick), and the Pulitzer finalist Omnium Gatherum. His film credits include All Saints Day and Coach. His writing has appeared in The Paris Review, New York Magazine, The London Review of Books, and Eight by Eight. He holds a BA from Sarah Lawrence College and an MFA from the Yale School of Drama. Will Frears in interviewed by Jillian Jetton '23 and Michelle Cowles '22 The SLC Performance Lab is produced by ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program. During the course, visiting artists to the MFA Theatre Program's Grad Lab are interviewed after leading a workshop with the students. Grad Lab is one of the core components of the program where graduate students work with guest artists and develop group-generated performance experiments.

The SLC Performance Lab is produced by ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program. During the course, visiting artists to the MFA Theatre Program's Grad Lab are interviewed after leading a workshop with the students. Grad Lab is one of the core components of the program where graduate students work with guest artists and develop group-generated performance experiments. Machine was interviewed by Andrew Del Vecchio (SLC22) and Alex Guhde (SLC23). MACHINE DAZZLE has been dazzling stages via costumes, sets, and performances since his arrival in New York in 1994. Credits include Julie Atlas Muz’s I Am The Moon And and You Are The Man On Me (2004), Big Art Group’s House Of No More (2006), Justin Vivian Bond’s Lustre (2008) and Re:Galli Blonde (2011), Chris Tanner’s Football Head (2014), Soomi Kim’s Change (2015), Pig Iron Theater’s I Promised Myself To Live Faster (2015), Bombay Ricky (Prototype Festival 2016), Opera Philadelphia’s Dito and Aeneus (2017) and Spiegleworld’s Opium (Las Vegas 2018). With Taylor Mac, Machine has collaborated on several projects including The Lily’s Revenge (2009), Walk Across America For Mother Earth (2012) and the Pulitzer Prize-Nominated A 24-Decade History of Popular Music (2016-Present). Conceptualist-as-artist meets DIY meets “glitter rhymes with litter,” Machine was a co-recipient the 2017Bessie Award for Outstanding Visual Design and the winner of a 2017 Henry Hewes Design Award.

The SLC Performance Lab is produced by ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program. Each month a visiting artist to the MFA Theatre Program's Grad Lab is interviewed. Grad Lab is one of the core components of the program where graduate students work with guest artists and develop group-generated performance pieces monthly. Jaami was interviewed by Chanel Blanchett (SLC21) and Ricky Brown (SLC22). Jaamil Olawale Kosoko is a Nigerian American performance artist, poet, and curator originally from Detroit, MI. He is a 2019 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Choreography, 2019 NPN Development Fund Award, a 2017-19 Princeton Arts Fellow, 2019 Red Bull Writing Fellow, 2018 NEFA NDP Production Grant recipient, and a 2017 Cave Canem Poetry Fellow. His creative practice draws from Black study, queer theories of the body, weaving together visual performance, lecture, ritual, and spiritual practice. His most recent works, Séancers (2017) and the Bessie nominated #negrophobia (2015), have toured internationally appearing in major festivals including: Tanz im August (Berlin), Moving in November (Finland), Within Practice (Sweden), TakeMeSomewhere (UK), Brighton Festival (UK), Oslo Teaterfestival (Norway), and Zürich MOVES! (Switzerland) among others. He is the author of two chapbooks and his poems and essays have been included in The American Poetry Review, The Dunes Review, The Broad Street Review, among others. Visit jaamil.com for more information. IG@jaamil_means_beauty Photo by Aisha Nailah

The SLC Performance Lab is produced by ContemporaryPerformance.com and the Sarah Lawrence College MFA Theatre Program. Each month a visiting artist to the MFA Theatre Program's Grad Lab is interviewed. Grad Lab is one of the core components of the program where graduate students work with guest artists and develop group-generated performance pieces monthly. Caleb Hammons is interviewed by Kyrie Ellison (SLC21) and Andrew Del Vecchio (SLC22). CALEB HAMMONS is a Tony and Obie Award-winning cultural producer and curator of performance working in Brooklyn and the Hudson Valley. Currently the Director of Artistic Planning and Producing at the Fisher Center at Bard, he facilitates Live Arts Bard, a professional commissioning, residency, and presenting initiative focusing on contemporary practices in the performing arts, produces an extensive portfolio of dance, theater, live music, and transdisciplinary performance projects, and co-curates the Bard SummerScape Spiegeltent. Prior to his time at Bard he was the Producer at Soho Rep in NYC and was the first Producing Director of Young Jean Lee's Theater Company from 2008 to 2011. He is the Co-Curator of the acclaimed Brooklyn-based performance series CATCH. Caleb holds a BFA from the NYU/Tisch Experimental Theatre Wing and was a member of the Institute for Curatorial Practice in Performance’s inaugural class at Wesleyan University. Photo is by Maria Baranova