Collaborators::
GRISHA COLEMAN: Composer/ Choreographer
Born and raised in New York City, Coleman is currently a fellow at the STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University. From 1991-1994 she danced with the Urban Bush Women. In 1995, Coleman created the music-performance group HOTMOUTH which toured extensively nationally and internationally and was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for "Most Unique Theatrical Experience."
For the development of echo::system, Coleman has worked with multiple collaborators working outside of specific art disciplines, conducting residencies for research and development at the Banff New Media Institute in Canada, Beall Center for Art and Technology at UC Irvine, and California Institute for the Arts. Coleman is a graduate of the College of Letters at Wesleyan University and received her MFA in Composition and Integrated Media from California Institute of the Arts.
Michael Bryant: Population Biologist
Bryant received a BSc from McGill University and an MSc from Concordia University. He is a lecturer in the School of Critical Studies at the California Institute of the Arts and is currently finishing his PhD in biology at the University of California, Riverside. A common thread throughout his research is the use of computer models to extrapolate complex emergent patterns from comparatively simple evolutionary processes.
Onome Ekeh: Writer
Ekeh is a New York based, Nigerian born writer. A frequent contributor to various new technology journals, film and art publications in Europe and the US, she has recently begun to produce work for the theater. She was a recipient of a 2000 NYSCA/Media Alliance grant fellowship as well as a 2002 Artist-In-Residence at Harvestworks Digital Media Arts Center in New York City where she produced "lovemad" a sound-cinema project.
Tony Mulanix: Lighting Designer
Mulanix has designed extensively for performance art, theatre, dance and site specific installations. His work has been well received in the US and abroad. Recent credits include Belle Epoque at Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, Lincoln Center. Mulanix has worked on more than twenty productions with Eve Adamson at Jean Cocteau Repertory. He holds a master of fine arts degree from California Institute of the Arts.
John Oduroe: Architect
Oduroe is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon's School of Architecture. He is currently completing graduate studies in the Department of Geography at the University College of London.
Robert Peagler: Information Architect
Peagler recently co-founded the Design Studio for Social Intervention and has affiliation with the MIT Center for Reflective Community Practice. He is also an Associate Researcher in Interdisciplinary Collaboration and Emerging Organizational Structures for SMARTlabCentre at Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design, University of the Arts London. At MIT, his plan is to "imagine fertile terraces strung between orthogonal notions, and then till them."
PERFORMERS
Anitra Brooks
Brooks is a multi-disciplined actor, international performing artist and singer-songwriter. After graduating from Brown University with a degree in Theatre Arts and a specialty in Middle East Studies & Arabic Language, she toured the United States and the world with the internationally known Drama Desk award-nominated puppet performers & masked musicians “Big Nazo” (www.bignazo.com). Complementing that experience she began to study and perform with Grisha Coleman. Brooks and Coleman continue to collaborate in Coleman’s live art experience “echo::system.” After extensive touring and having developed a broad avant-garde theatre repertoire, Brooks grounded herself in New York City where she has performed at the Public Theatre, Belasco Theatre, LaMama, HERE Arts Center, Kraine Theatre, Ohio Theatre and National Black Theatre. She can also be caught on numerous television and radio commercials as well as on soap operas One Life to Live, As the World Turns, All My Children and Guiding Light. www.anitrabrooks.com
Sherwood Chen
Chen has worked with artists including Anna Halprin, inkBoat/Shinichi Iova-Koga, Sara Shelton Mann and Oguri, and was a resident member of Min Tanaka’s performance collective Maijuku in rural Japan. Chen facilitates Body Weather Laboratory movement research training originally developed by Tanaka, and is Associate Director of the Alliance for California Traditional Arts.
Wendell Cooper
Cooper is a performing artist originally from Pittsburgh. Currently based in Brooklyn, NY, he presents work in festivals and galleries, and regularly performs with nicholasleichterdance. Cooper’s roots are in urban dance, contemporary dance and live art. He received his B.A. in dance from the George Washington University and is also a certified energy-bodywork practitioner and yoga instructor. www.dancingbeam.com
Reginald Ellis Crump
Reginald Ellis Crump’s, a.k.a MonstaH BlacK, multidimensional works of art employ the disciplines of musical composition, choreography and theater in seamless harmony. Based in Harlem since 1999, MonstaH BlacK has garnered support from DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, Career Transitions For Dancers, Blackout Arts Collective, Topaz Arts and Thelma Hill Performing Arts Center (THPAC), where he was commissioned to create an evening-length work entitled “THIS.” MonstaH BlacK is a recipient of a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Choreography and Performance from Virginia Commonwealth University and is currently working on a Master of Fine Arts Degree at Long Island University (Brooklyn Campus) in New Media Art and Performance. His current work as a Music Video Director can be seen in “To The Sky” written and performed by Recording Artist, Manchildblack, now in rotation on BET J and available on Youtube.com. in the fall of 2007 he will release his debut album, Monstah Black. www.myspace.com/monstahblackmusic.
Soomi Kim
Korean born actor/multidisciplinary artist Soomi Kim has performed and participated in Coleman’s “echo::system—The Desert” in residencies at CMU and UMass, Amherst as well as a work in progress showing at Seattle’s On the Boards Theater. This past June, her original performance/theatre piece “Lee/gendary: a Deconstruction of Bruce Lee” (Kim plays Lee) was presented at the First National Asian American Theater Festival at the Beckett in New York City. Kim is also a company member of the all female experimental movement theater group Ex.p girl which will premiere “10 Plates” in October ‘07 at Here Arts Center in NYC. Other credits & venues include: lead roles in Fred Ho’s “Voice of the Dragon I & II” (martial arts performer), N.Y.T.W. (readings of works by playwright Julia Cho’s “BFE” and “99 Histories”), E.S.T., BAM’s Harvey Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Source, LaMaMa E.T.C. (first floor and Annex), the Kraine, Town Hall, Nuyorican Poets’ Café, Lincoln Center Institute (workshop of Liz Swado’s “Inside Out”), Denver Center Theatre (Pavel Dobrusky’s “Fables”). Television appearances include Law and Order, (Detective Shimura), Guiding Light, MTV and MTV2. Her physical training includes dance, martial arts, boxing and gymnastics. Special skill: can flip on the trampoline while playing the sax. www.soomikim.com
Born and raised in New York City, Coleman is currently a fellow at the STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University. From 1991-1994 she danced with the Urban Bush Women. In 1995, Coleman created the music-performance group HOTMOUTH which toured extensively nationally and internationally and was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for "Most Unique Theatrical Experience."
For the development of echo::system, Coleman has worked with multiple collaborators working outside of specific art disciplines, conducting residencies for research and development at the Banff New Media Institute in Canada, Beall Center for Art and Technology at UC Irvine, and California Institute for the Arts. Coleman is a graduate of the College of Letters at Wesleyan University and received her MFA in Composition and Integrated Media from California Institute of the Arts.
Michael Bryant: Population Biologist
Bryant received a BSc from McGill University and an MSc from Concordia University. He is a lecturer in the School of Critical Studies at the California Institute of the Arts and is currently finishing his PhD in biology at the University of California, Riverside. A common thread throughout his research is the use of computer models to extrapolate complex emergent patterns from comparatively simple evolutionary processes.
Onome Ekeh: Writer
Ekeh is a New York based, Nigerian born writer. A frequent contributor to various new technology journals, film and art publications in Europe and the US, she has recently begun to produce work for the theater. She was a recipient of a 2000 NYSCA/Media Alliance grant fellowship as well as a 2002 Artist-In-Residence at Harvestworks Digital Media Arts Center in New York City where she produced "lovemad" a sound-cinema project.
Tony Mulanix: Lighting Designer
Mulanix has designed extensively for performance art, theatre, dance and site specific installations. His work has been well received in the US and abroad. Recent credits include Belle Epoque at Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, Lincoln Center. Mulanix has worked on more than twenty productions with Eve Adamson at Jean Cocteau Repertory. He holds a master of fine arts degree from California Institute of the Arts.
John Oduroe: Architect
Oduroe is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon's School of Architecture. He is currently completing graduate studies in the Department of Geography at the University College of London.
Robert Peagler: Information Architect
Peagler recently co-founded the Design Studio for Social Intervention and has affiliation with the MIT Center for Reflective Community Practice. He is also an Associate Researcher in Interdisciplinary Collaboration and Emerging Organizational Structures for SMARTlabCentre at Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design, University of the Arts London. At MIT, his plan is to "imagine fertile terraces strung between orthogonal notions, and then till them."
PERFORMERS
Anitra Brooks
Brooks is a multi-disciplined actor, international performing artist and singer-songwriter. After graduating from Brown University with a degree in Theatre Arts and a specialty in Middle East Studies & Arabic Language, she toured the United States and the world with the internationally known Drama Desk award-nominated puppet performers & masked musicians “Big Nazo” (www.bignazo.com). Complementing that experience she began to study and perform with Grisha Coleman. Brooks and Coleman continue to collaborate in Coleman’s live art experience “echo::system.” After extensive touring and having developed a broad avant-garde theatre repertoire, Brooks grounded herself in New York City where she has performed at the Public Theatre, Belasco Theatre, LaMama, HERE Arts Center, Kraine Theatre, Ohio Theatre and National Black Theatre. She can also be caught on numerous television and radio commercials as well as on soap operas One Life to Live, As the World Turns, All My Children and Guiding Light. www.anitrabrooks.com
Sherwood Chen
Chen has worked with artists including Anna Halprin, inkBoat/Shinichi Iova-Koga, Sara Shelton Mann and Oguri, and was a resident member of Min Tanaka’s performance collective Maijuku in rural Japan. Chen facilitates Body Weather Laboratory movement research training originally developed by Tanaka, and is Associate Director of the Alliance for California Traditional Arts.
Wendell Cooper
Cooper is a performing artist originally from Pittsburgh. Currently based in Brooklyn, NY, he presents work in festivals and galleries, and regularly performs with nicholasleichterdance. Cooper’s roots are in urban dance, contemporary dance and live art. He received his B.A. in dance from the George Washington University and is also a certified energy-bodywork practitioner and yoga instructor. www.dancingbeam.com
Reginald Ellis Crump
Reginald Ellis Crump’s, a.k.a MonstaH BlacK, multidimensional works of art employ the disciplines of musical composition, choreography and theater in seamless harmony. Based in Harlem since 1999, MonstaH BlacK has garnered support from DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, Career Transitions For Dancers, Blackout Arts Collective, Topaz Arts and Thelma Hill Performing Arts Center (THPAC), where he was commissioned to create an evening-length work entitled “THIS.” MonstaH BlacK is a recipient of a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Choreography and Performance from Virginia Commonwealth University and is currently working on a Master of Fine Arts Degree at Long Island University (Brooklyn Campus) in New Media Art and Performance. His current work as a Music Video Director can be seen in “To The Sky” written and performed by Recording Artist, Manchildblack, now in rotation on BET J and available on Youtube.com. in the fall of 2007 he will release his debut album, Monstah Black. www.myspace.com/monstahblackmusic.
Soomi Kim
Korean born actor/multidisciplinary artist Soomi Kim has performed and participated in Coleman’s “echo::system—The Desert” in residencies at CMU and UMass, Amherst as well as a work in progress showing at Seattle’s On the Boards Theater. This past June, her original performance/theatre piece “Lee/gendary: a Deconstruction of Bruce Lee” (Kim plays Lee) was presented at the First National Asian American Theater Festival at the Beckett in New York City. Kim is also a company member of the all female experimental movement theater group Ex.p girl which will premiere “10 Plates” in October ‘07 at Here Arts Center in NYC. Other credits & venues include: lead roles in Fred Ho’s “Voice of the Dragon I & II” (martial arts performer), N.Y.T.W. (readings of works by playwright Julia Cho’s “BFE” and “99 Histories”), E.S.T., BAM’s Harvey Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Source, LaMaMa E.T.C. (first floor and Annex), the Kraine, Town Hall, Nuyorican Poets’ Café, Lincoln Center Institute (workshop of Liz Swado’s “Inside Out”), Denver Center Theatre (Pavel Dobrusky’s “Fables”). Television appearances include Law and Order, (Detective Shimura), Guiding Light, MTV and MTV2. Her physical training includes dance, martial arts, boxing and gymnastics. Special skill: can flip on the trampoline while playing the sax. www.soomikim.com