contact: sarah@ashkin.com
Sarah Ashkin is a choreographer, educator, and curator using dance as a tool for embodied political intervention.
She understands the performance-making process as a feminist, anti-capitalist, anti-racist practice that emerges from collaborative content creation and community engagement. As a dance educator and body-based artist she positions embodied expression as a tool to to dismantle and rebuild our world for the better. Ashkin uses weight, task, gesture, humor, intimacy, and musicality, to illuminate socio-political stories of people and place. Her work is made in response to specific sites of inquiry and situates itself between postmodern dance, performance art, and social practice.
Her collaborative curatorial platform for place-based dance, GROUND SERIES, has created works in Los Angeles, London, New York, Philadelphia, New Mexico, and the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to producing and performing her own dance works, Ashkin enjoys supporting and collaborating with fellow dancers and has done so all over the United States.
Ashkin earned an MA in Dance from Roehampton University and a BA from Wesleyan University. She is part of the 2020 Cohort at the UC Davis PhD program in Performance Studies.
EDUCATION
2017 University of Roehampton, London, UK
MA in Dance, Politics, and Sociology
2011 Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
BA in Dance
CHOREOGRAPHY
2012 - present Co-Founder/Curator/Choreographer, GROUND SERIES, Oakland, CA, Philadelphia, PA and Santa Fe, NM
2019 experiments with land and dance, a GROUND SERIES production, presented by Buckwheat Space, Morongo Valley, CA
2019 Our Bodies Warm in the Sun, Unsettled, presented by Mountain House, Chantry Flat, Arcadia, CA
2018 no grounds, a GROUND SERIES production, presented by The PASEO FESTIVAL 2018, Taos, NM
2018 TASK, a GROUND SERIES production, presented by Highways Performance Space, Santa Monica, CA
2016 listenings, University of Roehampton, London, UK
2016 White Ways of Knowing, University of Roehampton, London, UK
2016 Dancing In A Hard Place, a GROUND SERIES production, Center for Contemporary Arts, Santa Fe, NM
2015 Median Dances/ Dance for Film, Aa GROUND SERIES production, Santa Fe, NM
2015 123, a GROUND SERIES production, New Mexico School for the Arts, Santa Fe, NM
2012-2015 Inside/Out Site Specific Performance Series with students of New Mexico School for the Arts, Santa Fe, NM
2014 model citizen, a GROUND SERIES production, New Mexico Dance Coalition Choreographer’s Showcase, Santa Fe, NM
2013 LUMP TRAFFIC, a GROUND SERIES production, Liberty Lands Park Philadelphia, PA
2012 East Coast Bound, a GROUND SERIES production, Temescal Arts Center, Oakland, CA
2011 ORE, Santa Fe River Arroyo, Santa Fe, NM
2011 Dismantle, ’92 Theater, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
2010 Soft Catapult, Davidson Courtyard, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
2009 Remember in your Bones, The Macsher Space, Philadelphia, PA
PERFORMANCE COLLABORATION
2018 Seeking, Kai Hazelwood and Colab, Black Choreographers Festival, Dance Mission Theater, San Francisco, CA
2015 Chancy Dancing, Pedro Alejandro Dance and Dancers, a GROUND SERIES production, Railyard Performance Arts Center, Santa Fe, NM
2014 Across that Divide, Pedro Alejandro Dance and Dancers, New Mexico Dance Coalition Choreographer’s Showcase, Santa Fe, NM
2014 Federal Dances, Micaela Gardner Projects, Federal Park, Santa Fe, NM
2013 Windswept, Pedro Alejandro Dance and Dancers, Bessie Schonberg Studio, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
2013 Windswept Dance For Camera, Pedro Alejandro Dance and Dancers, The Foundry, Berkeley, CA
2012 Public Horse, Shayna Keller, Judson Memorial Church, New York, NY
2011 Fascinating! Her Resilience, Gina Athena Ulysse, Crowell Concert Hall, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
2011 Weathering, Shayna Keller, Indian Cove Amphitheater, Joshua Tree National Park, CA
2008 The Energy which Remains, Katja Kolcio, Ukrainian Cultural Center, New York City, NY
DANCE/MOVEMENT TEACHING EXPERIENCE
2020 - present Lead Facilitator and Founder, Practice Progress, Addressing White Supremacy through Body Based Learning in schools,
the workplace and community. Clients: Sonoma State University (2020) TCU (2020), CalArts (2020)
2019 Master Teacher, Inquiry Based Making and Whiteness in Dance, Undergraduate Courses: Advanced Composition and
Introduction to Dance Appreciation, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, CA
2019 Teaching Artist, Social Practice and Racial Justice, Undergraduate Course: Basics in Social Practice, University of Irvine
Claire Trevor School of the Arts, Irvine, CA
2018 - 2019 TK-8 Dance Program Director and Instructor, Arts In Action Charter School, Los Angeles, CA
2019 Teaching Artist, Social Practice and Racial Justice, Undergraduate Course Basics in Social Practice, University of Irvine
Claire Trevor School of the Arts, Irvine, CA
2018 Workshop Facilitator, Embodiment and White Supremacy, Alliance of White Anti-Racists Everywhere, Los Angeles, CA
2018 Teaching Artist, Site–Specific Dance Making, Workshop for Professional Dancers and CalArts Students, Los Angeles, CA
2018 Guest Lecturer, Tarrying with the White Supremacies of Western Concert Dance, Lecture/Demonstration, Pieter
Performance Space, Los Angeles, CA
2016 - 2017 Facilitator, Racial Justice in Dance Studies, University of Roehampton, London, UK
2015 Pre K- Elementary Dance Teacher, Moving Arts, Espanola, NM
2012 - 2015 High School Dance Faculty, New Mexico School for the Arts, Santa Fe, NM
2014 Teaching Apprenticeship with Paul Langland, New Mexico School for the Arts, Santa Fe, NM
2012 - 2013 High School Modern Dancer Teacher, Oakland International High School, Oakland, CA
2011 Preschool Creative Dance Teacher, Neighborhood Preschool, Middletown, CT
2011 Course Assistant, Site-Specific Dance Making, Prof. Pedro Alejandro, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
2011 Course Assistant, Composition I: Solo Making, Prof. Nicole Stanton, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
2010 Course Assistant, Modern III, Prof Rachel Boggia, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT