Artist Bios

Judith H Shuǐ Xiān is a choreographer, improviser, and sound artist based in Minneapolis. She is a 2017/2022 Q-Stage: New Works and 2019 Momentum: New Dance Works recipient and was part of the 2022 Red Eye Works-In-Progress cohort. She is currently focused on researching ritual & meditation through experimental performance.

Anat Shinar is a Minneapolis-based dancer, choreographer, visual artist, educator, and curator. She graduated from the University of Minnesota with a BFA in Dance and a BA in Visual Arts, and completed her Master’s degree in Arts and Cultural Leadership, also at UMN. Her work has been commissioned by and presented at Hair + Nails Gallery, Center for Performance Research (Brooklyn), The Minnesota Museum of American Art, Walker Art Center, Pillsbury House Theater, Red Eye Theater, Southern Theater, The Soap Factory, SooVAC, and the Bryant-Lake Bowl. She is the Artistic Director at Young Dance, a dance education non-profit. Anat was a 2018 Naked Stages Fellow at Pillsbury House Theater in Minneapolis.

Marcela Michelle (she/her) is a transdisciplinary artist, educator, and producer living and working on Mni Sota Makoce. Her work often deals with themes of simultaneity, im/mutability, and the body as host. She is a 2023-2025 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow in the inaugural Cross-Disciplinary field, a 2020-2022 Hennepin Theatre Trust Teaching artist in Residence, and a 2019 mentee of the National Institute for Directing and Ensemble Creation. Marcela has worked with Red Eye Theater, Walker Art Center, Pangea World Theater, Rough Magic Performance Company, Wanderlust Productions, Teatro del Pueblo, and Playwrights Center. With Lightning Rod, she has received commissions from Guthrie Theater, Northern Spark, and Pillsbury House + Theater. She is the former Artistic Director of 20% Theatre Company and the current Artistic Director of Lightning Rod, a QTGNC centered arts organism. She is a part of the queer bartending collective Mama San and a facilitator for HOPE Communities TRCSTR program. Upcoming work includes cocktail collaboration for Sadie Barnette's New Eagle Creek Saloon at Walker Art Center, and Red Eye’s Isolated Acts (NW4W). 

Rachel Lieberman has been dancing and choreographing since first convincing all siblings and cousins to comply with rehearsals for holiday routines in the living room. Growing up in and around Chicago, she trained and performed primarily with Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago. After graduating from Macalester College in 2018, Rachel has performed in works by Minneapolis-based artists and contemporary dance companies Contempo Physical, Leila Awadallah, Off-Leash Area, A Cripple’s Dance, Mathew Janczewski, Analog Dance Works, and Black Label Movement. She has also choreographed solo and group works in collaboration with Alternative Motion Project, Franconia Sculpture Garden, and Candy Box Festival. Rachel also works as a Program Director at Cow Tipping Press, teaching and publishing creative writing by adults with intellectual/developmental disabilities.

Megan Mayer: I am an award-winning artist who has worked in Minneapolis for 30+ years. I work with choreography, dance, experimental video and photography. My work pulls from minimalism, transposition, mimicry, grief, wry humor, loneliness, social anxiety, fake bad timing and exacting musicality. Drawn to the edges of the experience of performing: the anticipatory rapid heartbeat before going onstage, and the regretful relief after exiting, my dances often reveal where that switch lives in the body. In 2023 I premiered a pair of dances as one of the featured artists for CANDY BOX at the Southern Theater. My work has received support from McKnight Foundation Fellowships in Choreography (2016, 2010), numerous national and regional choreographic residencies including NCC in Akron, OH (2019) and MANCC in Tallahassee, FL (2012), grants from Jerome Foundation, MRAC and MSAB, and various commissions. www.meganmayer.com