Keith Hennessy in collaboration...
Fabric
Weaving queer threads to build skills, generate conversation, and have a fab time with performances and free food
Fabric aims to uplift under-addressed issues and needs in the fields of experimental dance and performance; teachers and presented artists are majority QTBIPOC and all events are free. Instigated by Clarissa Dyas in collaboration with Keith Hennessy and Alley Wilde, Fabric launched in June 2024 with three panel conversations and a performance salon. 2025 will feature workshops in lighting, sound, and costumes with panel conversations and performance salon.
::: COMING UP :::
Luminary Thots
Sat-Sun Feb 8-9 from 12pm-4pm
@ CounterPulse [80 Turk Street, SF]
Join renowned local lighting designer GG Torres for a weekend workshop to learn the process of designing lights for performance. This workshop is geared towards multidisciplinary artists who want to better understand lighting, technicians and AV workers wanting to skill up, and for people who may want to pursue lighting design or theater tech as a job.
Participants will learn the creative principles and theories of lighting design, lighting equipment and board programming, how to develop and enact a design, and generally have deeper understanding and agency with lights, as designers or performers.
This workshop will also benefit choreographers and performance directors to better collaborate and communicate with lighting designers and technical directors. How to get the looks you want? How to understand the options, limitations, and possibilities of lighting?
The Bay Area has an ongoing need for workers in theater tech and production, from freelance tech support to technical directors, stage managers, and visual designers. This workshop intentionally opens these career pathways to QT and BIPOC folks whose voices, visions, and perspectives are too rare in the fields of lighting design and theater tech. You can be a lighting designer.
This workshop is free, includes lunch, and is limited to ten participants.
::: THE PAST :::
failed performance gala
Fri June 14th :: 7:00pm-12:00am
Queer performance, dancing, community and free dinner
Presented in collaboration with forever failing
@ Omni Commons [4799 Shattuck Ave, Oakland]
This is a kick-off party for Fabric x forever failing hosted by Clarissa Rivera Dyas & ainsley tharp & Co-Produced by Circo Zero. failed performance gala is an evening extravaganza of shit art by local performers, a delicious dinner, DJ & dancing post performances, and a grand ole community time.
Come fail with us. Make me throw up a little. Crash expectations. Expect minimal tech. Take risks. FAIL HARDER. Fuck cultural pressure, euro-centric capitalistic bullshit, and elitism.
The event is FREE and there will be FREE food.
Strengthening Solidarity Between Two-Spirits and Queer/Trans Palestinians
Sat June 15th :: 6:00pm-8:00pm
A panel discussion curated by Snowflake Calvert
@ Queer AF [575 Castro Street, SF… former home of Harvey Milk’s camera shop]
An insightful panel discussion exploring how 2Spirit/Indigiqueers and Queer/Trans Palestinians can foster greater solidarity and support for one another. This event will feature activists and community leaders who will share strategies, experiences, and practical steps to building stronger bridges, enhance mutual understanding, and build a more united front. Whether you're a member of these groups or an ally, this discussion will help to provide valuable perspectives and actionable insights for creating stronger community alliances between the two groups represented.
Dykes in Dance
Tue June 18th :: 6:30pm-8:30pm
@ Wildcat Studios [2547 Eighth Street, Berkeley]
Featuring:
• amara tabor-smith —- IG: amaratsmith
• Chibueze Crouch —- IG: @carefreeblackauntie
• Frances Teves Sedayo — IG: fsedayao
• Jess Bozzo —- IG: jesssybooo
• Richelle Donigan —- IG: ojahlife
• All the amazing folks —- IG: queeringdancefestival
A panel conversation troubling and uplifting the liminal category of “Dyke,” exploring Dyke culture, Dyke identity, and Dyke history in dance. We will discuss the history of queer women*, lesbian and dyke dancers and choreographers in the Bay Area.
How have they played a foundational role in the queer community and local dance scene? How have their stories been invisibilized or re-framed over time? From the 70s, 80s, and 90s to the 2000s, the definition of “dyke” has changed, with some feeling included or excluded by this term as gender identities beyond the binary have become more visible. Are we in a post-dyke era? How have younger generations re-defined what “dyke” means to them? How do older generations feel about these shifting identities? And how has all of this impacted the dance ecosystem in San Francisco and beyond?
Collective Power: Working Without Hierarchy
Sat June 22nd :: 5:00pm-7:00pm
Panel discussion curated by Circo Zero
Featuring members of Asian Babe Gang, Bridge Live Arts, Queering Dance Festival, rupture, a worker-owned cooperative, and Bay Anarchist Free School
@ Temescal Arts Center [511 48th St, Oakland]
Are you tired of bosses or choreographers barking orders? Are you organizing to abolish top-down business as usual? Working in a collective and facing tough questions? With a focus on dance and culture work, this panel conversation brings together members of six different Bay Area collectives to share stories, questions, and ideas about working without hierarchy.
Testing Ground: A choreo lab with jose abad & Keith Hennessy
Mondays 6:00pm-9:00pm :: Nov 11 - Dec 2
Co-Presented with The Lab
Experimental approaches to choreography and performance making. Let’s liberate our imaginations and bodies by expanding what’s possible? How does improvisation talk to choreography? How do our politics impact our aesthetics impact the process of making the dance? How are care and repair integrated into rehearsal, production, and choreography? How do traditional, folk, diasporic dances flow with “contemporary” and “experimental” practices?
Mon Nov 11 - Mon Dec 2 @ The Lab [2948 16th St, San Francisco, CA 94103]