Guest – SALT Contemporary Dance

Amy Gunter Lolofie

Amy received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance from Brigham Young University where she performed with dancEnsemble and Contemporary Dance Theatre.

While at BYU, Amy was on a performance scholarship through the dance department, and received the Outstanding Performer award in 2016.

As the teaching assistant for Kinesiology at BYU she developed a strong understanding and passion for the body.

She incorporates this knowledge into all of the classes she teaches, and loves to help others understand how to dance from a functional place.

Amy is always looking for new experiences to learn and has performed with Repertory Dance Theater as a guest artist in the masterwork “Missa Brevis”, choreographed by Jose Limon.

She also attended San Francisco Conservatory of Dance in summer 2016, learning from professionals with resumes that include San Fancisco Ballet, LINES ballet, and Batsheva.

She currently dances for SALT Contemporary Dance where she performs works by world-renowned choreographers.

Roderick George was born and raised in Houston, Texas, where he began his studies and classical training at Ben Stevenson’s Houston Ballet Academy. Roderick continued to develop his skill by exploring modern technique at The Alvin Ailey School, all the while developing a collaboration of the techniques at the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Houston, TX. After his general studies Roderick left his hometown and assimilated in New York City, where he began his undergraduate studies at SUNY Purchase College in 2003.

Before starting his professional career, he was a bronze winner of the Youth American Grand Prix competition in New York City in 2005 and was elected as a Presidential Scholar of the Arts in 2003, where he performed for the US President at the Kennedy Center. Roderick joined Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet in 2005, which was very early on in his career engraving the beginning of his footprints in the dance world. Roderick explored more of New York as he danced with Sidra Bell Dance NY, and the Kevin Wynn Collection, until he decided to move abroad to Switzerland where Roderick joined the Basel Ballet/ Theater Basel in 2007 and later to guest with the Goteborg Operan DansKompani in 2012.

Beginning of February of 2014, Roderick moved on to be be under the direction of William Forsythe with The Forsythe Company in Frankfurt, Germany. His career has embraced the collaborations of his work and other great choreographers such as Marie Chouinard, Peeping Tom, Jorma Elo, Jacopo Godani, William Forsythe, Johan Inger, Jiří Kylian, Sharon Eyal, Ohan Naharin, Benoit Swan-Pouffer, Richard Wherlock, and many others.

Along with his talent as a dancer, Roderick also found a passion for choreography since the early years of 2002. At the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, the school enhances and coaches the dancers to work with improve studies and composition at a very young age, heightening creativity prior to university. Thus noting other prodigious achievements alongside his selection as Presidential Scholar for the NFAA ARTS competition, Roderick was named Honorable Mention for his first choreography also by the ARTS Association in 2003.

Later he was able to showcase his work at Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet, in the DanceLab at Ballett Basel and one of the main choreographers with the Ballett Basel School, and The Suburbia project, with the Goteborg Operan DansKompani. Roderick was selected to be an Emerging Choreographer for Springboard Dans Montreal in the summer of 2013. Roderick was also nominated to be a choreographer and performer at the Emerging Choreographer Series for the Youth American Grand Prix of 2012, where he continues to use prior knowledge and experiences to not only improve his choreographic work but also his talent and development as a contemporary performer.

Olivier Wevers
(he/him/his)

From ballet training in his native Belgium, Olivier learned the beauty, passion and discipline of the art. On coming to North America at age 19, he discovered the exhilaration of many new dance forms. As a principal dancer, first with Royal Winnipeg Ballet and later, for most of his dancing career, with Pacific Northwest Ballet, he acquired his strong conviction that dancers are the heart and soul of a company. As such they, and artists in general, must live at the very center of the process, their dignity, psychological and creative growth and safety deemed just as essential as their technical accomplishments.

During his years of performing in classical and contemporary works by choreographers from around the world, Olivier also discovered the thrill of making dances and how imaginative story-telling and movement exploration connect to caring about individuality and physicality. Creating dances fed his perennial curiosity. It became “my way to express myself and, during the process, to be able to learn more about the human condition, start dialogues, touch people and share ideas, reflecting on our times and our humanity.”

While still dancing with PNB and developing his own choreographic approach, Olivier became convinced that only by starting his own company could he create the works he envisioned in an artist-centered sanctuary where kindness, empathy, and collaboration are built into the very DNA. The result is Whim W’Him, with its yearly Choreographic Shindig for which the dancers choose the choreographers; emphasis on new works; transparent and candid leadership; ethical practices and equitable pay; commitment to diversity and social justice; and dedication to uncovering and nurturing new voices.

AWARDS

City of Seattle’s Mayor’s Arts Award, 2012
Princess Grace Choreographic Fellowship Award, 2011
Annual Dance Under the Stars Choreography Festival Grand prize Awards, 2010 & 2011
Dance Magazine 25 to watch, 2011
Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Fellowship Award, 2008

COLLABORATIONS

Ballet X, Philadelphia, PA
Cornish Dance Theater, Seattle, WA
Canada’s Royal Winnipeg Ballet
Czech Republic’s Ballet of the National Theatre Brno
Grand Rapids Ballet, Grand Rapids, MI
National Choreographers Initiative, Irvine, CA
New York Choreographic Institute, New York, NY
Northwest Dance Project, Portland, OR
Pacific Northwest Ballet, Seattle, WA
Prix de Lausanne Gala, Tokyo, JAPAN
Seattle Dance Project, Seattle, WA
SFDanceworks, San Francisco, CA
Spectrum Dance Theater, Seattle, WA
White Bird’s 4×4 Ballet Project, Portland, OR

Omar Román De Jesús

Omar Román De Jesús (Bayamón, Puerto Rico) is a recipient of the 2020 Jacob's Pillow: The Ann & Weston Hicks Choreography Fellowship. He has been commissioned twice by Instituto de Cultura de Puerto Rico to create work for the International Dance Festival of Puerto Rico, where he was awarded the Ambassador of Dance medal. Omar has won choreographic competitions including the Joffrey Academy of Dance's Winning Works Choreographic Competition and the Whim W’Him’s Choreographic Shindig. He has received awards including the Audience Award at The Dance Gallery Festival, 1st place prize at the Reverb Dance Festival and the Parsons Dance GenerationNOW Commission for their 2017 Joyce Season. He has also created work for Bruce Wood Dance, Jacob Jonas The Company, and educational institutions like The Ailey School, Kennesaw State University, James Madison University and Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. This fall, his work was presented at PRISMA International Dance Festival (Panama), ENDANZANTE (Colombia), Chop Shop: Bodies of Work Contemporary Dance Festival (Seattle), and will be presented at the upcoming Jerusalem International Choreographic Competition.

Omar is fond of education and has experience teaching workshops and master classes all over the world for dancers, special needs communities, people with physical disabilities, and marginalized communities.

Dance Background

Omar began his formal training at the School for the Performing Arts in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. Omar was a member of Balleteatro Nacional de Puerto Rico from 2006-2011. During this period, he won the Championship Cup and Gold Medal at the National Dance Competition in Puerto Rico. He received a scholarship to the Ailey School in 2011, and after two years, he began his professional career in the modern and contemporary dance world. He has toured nationally and internationally with Yin Yue Dance Company, Ballet Hispánico, Parsons Dance, Wylliams/Henry Contemporary Dance Company, and Sleeping Beauty Dreams featuring Diana Vishneva. He has performed and led works by Gustavo Ramírez Sansano, David Parsons, Robert Battle, Trey McIntyre, Kate Skarpetowska, Jennifer Archibald, Carlos Pons, Ephrat Asherie, and Yin Yue. Omar had the honor of performing at the 2018 TITAS Gala representing Ballet Hispánico, and he is proud to have danced at BAM Fisher, NY and the 2019 Schrittmacher Festival in Germany, where he performed an evening-length show by Yin Yue. Omar collaborated with Erin Sullivan on an Interactive Projection Workshop titled Spine Lines, which was presented at Yale University - Center of the Collaborative Arts and Media.

Madison Hicks, originally from Dallas, TX, graduated from Booker T. Washington
HSPVA in 2014. She received her BFA from The Juilliard School in May 2018 and her
MFA in Choreography in 2021 from California Institute of the Arts. Madison is a
freelance creator, performer, and educator. In 2022, she received the Orsolina28 “Call
for Creation” residency for her project, “Corrupt(ed)”. Madison was one of eight
choreographers chosen for The Jacobs Pillow Ann and Weston Hicks Choreographic
Fellowship in 2021. In the Summer of 2022, she was a guest choreographer at The
Juilliard School’s Summer Intensive. In the Fall of 2022, she is thrilled to be
commissioned by The Fordham Ailey BFA program, Peabody University, and Vitacca
Ballet for new creations. She is a company artist with Sidra Bell Dance New York. She is
the Director and Founder of Moving Forward Dallas, an innovative dance intensive and
Non-Profit Organization for young artists. She is the Resident Choreographer for New
York Dance Project and has been commissioned by companies such as Ballet Arkansas,
Avant Chamber Ballet, Mash-Up Contemporary Dance company, Ballet Project OC,
Orange County School of the Performing and Visual Arts, Water Street Dance
Milwaukee, and Lindenwood University to create new work. She has presented work at
Boston Dance Festival, LA Dance Festival, Palm Desert Choreography Festival, and
others. She premiered her recent solo work “Sparkle with a K” at The Navel Theater in
Downtown Los Angeles in 2020. She has been a guest choreographer for Booker T.
Washington HSPVA Rep II Ensemble, The University of Texas at Austin, Center of
Creative Arts, Houston MET Too, San Diego Civic Center, and The Windward School
along with rigorously teaching artists of all ages. Madison is a faculty member at Steps
on Broadway and Peridance Center. She is excited to join the Break The Floor Faculty in
2022.

She was full-time company member with LA Dance Project under the direction of
Benjamin Millepied for the 2018/2019 season. Since then, Madison has been a lead
dancer in both Noosa Yoghurt and Lexus Commercials along with choreographing
music videos for Eleanor Kingston and the Handsome Ghost. She was a 2013 YoungArts
winner for modern dance, 2014 US Presidential Scholar in the Arts Nominee and a guest
artist in the 2014 YoungArts Presidential Scholar Gala under the direction of Bill T.
Jones. In January of 2017, she performed as a distinguished guest alumnus in the
YoungArts annual Backyard Ball under the direction of Tony Yazbeck. She received a
choreography award from YAGP in 2014 and had three choreographic works chosen to
perform in The Choreographic Honors show at The Juilliard School. Madison was
awarded the Gene Kelly Legacy Scholarship for her choreography and jazz technique in
2016. She has performed works by Nacho Duato, Jiri Kylian, Emily Molnar, Kyle
Abraham, Ohad Naharin, Peter Chu, Merce Cunningham, Martha Graham, Aszure
Barton, Gustavo Ramirez Sansano, Benjamin Millepied, and Pam Tanowitz.

www.madisonhicks.com

JERMAINE SPIVEY

GABRIELLE LAMB

BANNING BOULDIN

BRENDAN DUGGAN

IHSAN RUSTEM

ALEX KETLEY