Artists Spotlight: Susan Banyas
Susan Banyas, writer and performer
Recipient RACC 2006 Project Grant
Susan Banyas is a dancer, director, and storyteller who has worked for the past 30 years to embody and express the poetry of everyday life. These expressions take form as theatrical monologues, dance stories, essays, and stories.
She co-founded Dreams Well Studio (1991-2003), a low tech performance and teaching laboratory, where she produced and directed poetry shows, Soul Stories evenings, dance/theatre pieces, and gender-inspired shows in collaborations with some of Portland’s finest theatre artists, poets, musicians, and dancers.
From February 16-18, 2007 she will present No Strangers Here Today at the Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center. This stirring poetic monologue-with-movement about political engagement dances between personal memory and American history from the Civil War to the present. Susan Banyas' Quaker Great Great Grandmother, Elizabeth Edwards, kept a diary during the Civil War with coded phrases suggesting her participation in the great socio-political movement called the Underground Railroad.
This production marks the premier of the work as a collaboration between Banyas and L.A. jazz artist, David Ornette Cherry. Cherry's compositions, soundscapes, and improvisational moments will weave through the piece to evoke drama, mood, and image. Movement and voice direction provided by Gregg Bielemeier and Gwynne Warner.
Contact Information:
website: http://strangers.scatter.com/
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RACC Staff to Contact
Mary Bauer
Communications Associate
503.823.5426
mbauer@racc.org
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