Keeping Boundaries/Breaking Barriers

Discussion and demos of women's traditional arts, diaspora and gender in contemporary Brooklyn featuring artists who were instrumental in breaking barriers to women's participation in performance. Panelists include African percussion specialist Edwina Tyler, Irish dancer Darrah Carr, Syrian Jewish Rabbi Dianne Cohler-Esses, Balkan singer Eva Primack, Indian traditional and modern dancer Parijat Desai and Palestinian dabkeh dancer Riham Barghouti.

Panelists

Riham Barghouti

Riham Barghouti is a Palestinian-American activist. She has been performing and teaching dabkeh, Palestinian folklore dance, from a very young age. Growing up in New York, she was active in the Arab Club, a community center that provided social, cultural and political awareness raising activities for young Palestinians in Brooklyn. She was a member of Watan Dance Troupe and founded Al Jaleel, a youth dance troupe. Barghouti lived in the occupied Palestinian territories from 1995 to 2005, during which time she was a member of El-Funoun the Palestinian Popular Dance Troupe, the leading dabke group in Palestine. In both the United States and Palestine she became aware of how empowering participation in traditional folklore is for Palestinian women. Such participation is a significant form of cultural preservation and cultural resistance, which enables them to challenge social, cultural and political barriers. Barghouti holds a BA in Sociology and Women's Studies, a MA in Gender, Law and Development and a MA in Education. She is currently a teacher in New York City.

Darrah Carr

Since 1998, Darrah Carr Dance has created a sensational and unique blend of traditional Irish step and contemporary modern dance. Artistic Director Darrah Carr recently coined the term "ModERIN" to describe her choreographic style. As a playful combination of the words "Modern" (dance) and "ERIN" (an Irish American reference to Ireland), "ModERIN" pinpoints the company's interest in drawing from Irish dance footwork, spatial patterns, and music cycles, and combining those influences with modern dance partnering and floorwork. Recent performance highlights include: a guest performance with The New York Pops at Carnegie Hall; a featured spot on NBC's "The Today Show;" the company's 10th Anniversary Season at the Irish Arts Center; and a performance at Celebrate Brooklyn. Darrah holds an MFA from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and she is currently pursuing her doctorate through Texas Woman's University. In addition to her work in performance and choreography, she is an instructor in both the Dance and Irish Studies programs at Hofstra University and she is a freelance writer for a variety of dance publications. For Half the Sky Festival, Darrah discusses changes in the Irish dance body from its points of origin in Ireland to its new expressions in Brooklyn and other parts of the U.S., especially the shift from social to competitive dance that began during the Gaelic Revival of the 1890s, as well as the shift from social to commercial dance as seen in productions such as Riverdance and Lord of the Dance. Darrah also addresses ways that she as a choreographer has thought about gender in traditional Irish dance and found creative ways to deconstruct it.

Dianne Cohler-Esses

Dianne Cohler-Esses is the first woman from Brooklyn's Syrian Jewish community to become a rabbi, as well as the first 'and currently the only' person from her community to become a non-Orthodox rabbi. She has taught and consulted widely in the Jewish world in such organizations as Ma'ayan, Jewish Life Network, and The Curriculum Initiative, and served on the faculties of the Skirball Center for Adult Jewish Learning, the Hebrew Union College Kollel, and the Edgar M. Bronfman Youth Fellowships in Israel (BYFI). In Half the Sky Festival's kickoff panel, "Keeping Boundaries/Breaking Barriers," Rabbi Cohler-Esses speaks on her breakthrough role in the Syrian and Ashkenazic Jewish worlds, and in the American and Jewish feminist movements.

Parijat Desai

Dancer and choreographer Parijat Desai formed Parijat Desai Dance Company in Los Angeles in 2000, and has been based in Brooklyn since 2004. She is in her third year as artist-in-residence at Tribeca Performing Arts Center. She had the honor of being invited to the 2011 White House Diwali celebration to represent a voice in South Asian American arts. Desai teaches both Indian classical and contemporary dance. She has taught at Queens College, Mark Morris Dance Center, Peridance Capezio Center, and Brooklyn Friends School. Through performance at events by Women's World Banking, South Asian Network, and EKTA, Desai has helped raise funds for microfinance, immigrant services, earthquake relief, and victims of communal violence. She has also helped raised funds for The Audre Lorde Project, an LGBTGNC center for people of color in NYC. For Half the Sky Festival, Parijat Desai Dance Company will be featured in Folk Feet Females on May 12. Ms. Desai will also speak on April 22 at Keeping Boundaries/ Breaking Barriers, one of two opening-weekend panels. The Indian classical dance style bharata natyam consists of both theatrical storytelling and pure dance built on sculptural body postures and rhythmic footwork. Parijat looks at gender roles in this tradition, and the ways she has drawn on the rich style but to present other narratives through dance. As a choreographer, Parijat also investigates bharata natyam as a movement practice and in her efforts to evolve the form, she aims to reflect her experience (and that of many other people) as an immigrant and South Asian American raised in the United States. Parijat will discuss her process of delving into classical traditions, while also experimenting with them, with the goal of speaking across cultural boundaries to a contemporary audience.

Eva Primack

A native of Santa Cruz, California, Eva Salina Primack has been studying, performing, and teaching Balkan music since she was a young child. She has studied with some of the greatest living singers of Balkan traditional music. Eva's rich, versatile, agile, deep and powerful voice and her enthusiastic, skillful, inspired and inspiring teaching have led her to quickly become known as a preeminent singer, interpreter, and teacher of Traditional Balkan Vocal music, singing through the traditions of Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey and the Romani people. She has also studied Georgian, Corsican, Traditional American, and Ukrainian singing. Eva has collaborated to varying degrees (performing, touring, recording, and teaching) with many Balkan and American musicians, including Slavic Soul Party!, Which Way East, Kadife, Veveritse, Choban Elektrik, Seido Salifoski's Romski Boji, Adessa, Tzvetanka Varimezova, Italian Balkan/Jazz Project Opa Cupa and KITKA. Eva received a B.A. in Ethnomusicology from UCLA, where she studied extensively with Tzvetanka Varimezova. From 2009-2011 Eva toured primarily with Ash, a vocal duo focused on the traditions of the Balkans, Appalachia, Caucasus Georgia, and Corsica. Currently, Eva is developing her own band, Eva Salina, featuring many prominent New York-based musicians, as well as collaborating with Merima Ključo, a Bosnian-born concert accordionist, and various other collaborations based in New York, Los Angeles, and Europe. Eva lives in Brooklyn and performs and teaches nationally and internationally at camps, workshops and festivals. For more information, please visit www.evasalinaprimack.com.

Edwina Tyler

Edwina Tyler is a percussionist, composer, vocalist, dancer and actress who blends these traditional arts into what she calls "jubilation." Active in Brooklyn in the 1980s and 90s, she pioneered the playing of traditional African percussion instruments by women, a practice forbidden in many African cultures. She directed A Piece of the World, an all-women African dance and drum ensemble. Her performances feature a combination of instruments: djembe, songbey, conga, steel drum, bongos, kalimba, shekere, conch shell, slit drum, rattles, and wood blocks. Tyler has appeared at Alice Tully Hall, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Dance Theatre Workshop, La Mama E.T.C., the Michigan Women's Music Festival, BAC's Black Brooklyn Renaissance Drum Call, and has toured throughout Europe, Africa and Korea. Tyler has recorded solo performances and has appeared as a percussionist on various CDs. Her recording, Drum Drama, was released on audio cassette by Percussion Piquant the 1980s. Her latest CD recording, Things Are Gonna Change, weaves together her unique style of African, jazz and classical rhythms. www.edwinatyler.com

Keeping Boundaries/Breaking Barriers is part of Brooklyn Arts Council's Half the Sky Festival: Brooklyn Women in Traditional Performance, an unprecedented series of concerts, performances, workshops and symposia highlighting Brooklyn women performing artists, especially those working in traditional art forms.