2022 FRESH MEAT FESTIVAL: Program 4

JanpiStar was born and raised in Puerto Rico. Janpi with a Degree in Drama at the University of Puerto Rico had the opportunity of working with important actresses and choreographers in the island. This Star worked with the theater group “Jóvenes del 98” ( 2016 -2018) in Puerto Rico until they move to Oakland California to joined AXIS Dance Company. JanpiStar has done works with choreographers like Petra Bravo with “instalaciones Coreograficas , las casitas de Santurce” in The fine arts center of Puerto Rico in 2016. One of their most recent solo work was commissioned for the Queering Dance Festival, “FROLIC“ 2019.

Cuauhtémoc Peranda, MFA (Mescalero Apache, Mexika-Chichimeca/Cano; & cihuaiolo butch queen: they/he/she/Father) is a Critical Dance Studies Ph.D. candidate at the University of California, Riverside (UCR). Their research and writing focuses on a critical review of the United States’ House Ballroom Scene, and the deployment of the political resistance and critique of vogue. As a dance artist, they have performed throughout California, and has presented dance work in New York, Seattle, London, Honolulu, Berlin, Cambridge, Mexico City and Tijuana. They walk and raise children in the West Coast Ballscenes, and they’re known as “Don’Té Peaches 007.”

Bio coming soon

Bio coming soon

Omar Monroy and Milton Martinez are World Salsa Champion dancers. Both Omar and Milton are from Mexico and share a passion for Latin dance. They placed first at the World Salsa Summit in the Salsa Same Gender division in 2021 and continue to create new work, compete, and teach Salsa at dance studios and around the world at Salsa Congresses.

Pioneer Winter (he/they, b. 1987) is a Miami-based choreographer and artistic director of Pioneer Winter Collective, an intergenerational and physically integrated dance-theater company, rooted in social practice and community, queer visibility and beauty beyond the mainstream. Recognized in Dance Magazine’s 25 to Watch, Pioneer Winter’s work democratizes performance in public spaces, museums and galleries, stage, and film. A major objective continues to be expanding the definition of all that dance is and can be so that all bodies survive, thrive, and are witnessed in spite of constant erasure based upon race, body type, age, and ability – this goes for both the artists as well as the audience. Pioneer has been commissioned by Miami Theater Center, Karen Peterson and Dancers, Tigertail Productions, Jacksonville Dance Theatre, FundArte, and the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, where Pioneer is the Center’s first Artist-in-Resident collaboration in a decade. Pioneer has been a guest artist at universities, including Miami Dade College, Nova Southeastern University, Broward College, and Florida State College. Most recently, Pioneer’s work has received support from NEFA’s National Dance Project Award, MAP Fund, the Knight Foundation, the Andrew Mellon Foundation, and Creative Capital. An extension of his creative practice, Pioneer has curated and directed ScreenDance Miami Festival since 2017, presented by Miami Light Project; Pioneer’s own films screen internationally. Pioneer serves as Assistant Teaching Professor in the Honors College and College of Communication, Architecture + The Arts at Florida International University. Pioneer is affiliated faculty at the Center for Humanities in an Urban Environment (CHUE) and an inaugural Fellow in the Miami Studies Program.

Shawna Virago is a songwriter celebrated for her lyric-based songs. She is one of the nation’s first openly transgender women to perform and tour nationally, and has performed as an out transwoman since the early 1990’s. She has been profiled online, in print and on radio including Bitch, the Advocate, Huffington Post Louder ThanWar, No Depression, Paste magazine, on NPR and PBS. POP DOSE Magazine wrote “In these turbulent times, you may often wonder, ‘Where’s our Bob Dylan? Where’s the bard of the 2010s translating the dicey political and social climate into musical stanzas?’… Enter Shawna Virago.” Virago is also a published writer and her work appears in several anthologies. She is also the Artistic Director of the San Francisco Transgender Film Festival. www.shawnavirago.com

Vanessa Sanchez (she/her) is a Chicana-Native dancer, choreographer, and educator who emphasizes the voices and experiences of Latina, Chicana and Indigenous women and youth through contemporary performance, community arts, and traditional dance forms. Sanchez is the director and founder of the San Francisco-based dance company, La Mezcla. vanessasanchez.net/lamezcla/

John Jota Leaños (he/we) is a Mestizo (Mexican-Italian-Chumash) interdisciplinary artist, filmmaker, animator, and Professor of Film and Digital Media at UC Santa Cruz. A Guggenheim Fellow and Creative Capital Artist, Leaños creates work within the embattled terrains of memory and history. leanos.net