"I view our bodies as everything: our bodies are culture, history, present and future, all at once. Out of respect for and trust in our bodies and collective memories, I give equal weight to story and image, to movement and stillness, to what I imagine and to what I do not know."
Emily Johnson,
Choreographer/Director
Emily Johnson is an artist who makes body-based work. Emily belongs to the Yup'ik Nation, is a land and water protector and an organizer for justice, sovereignty and well-being. A Bessie Award-winning choreographer, Guggenheim, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, United States Artists, Braiding Seeds, Forge Project, Center CIRCL Fellow, and recipient of the Doris Duke Artist Award, among others, Emily is based in Lenapehoking. Since 1998, Emily's large-scale performance gatherings insist thrivance, radical reworlding, and just futures. Her gatherings function as portals and care processions, engaging audienceship within and through space, time, environment—interacting with a place's architecture, peoples, histories and role in building futures. Emily is trying to make a world where performance is part of life; where performance is an integral connection to each other, our environment, our stories, our past, present and future.
Emily’s choreography and gatherings have been presented across what is currently called the United States, Canada, and Australia. Her current project, Overflow Radio is a performance, skill-share, planting of 1000 trees, and radio transmission taking place over 24 non-consecutive hours within a massive quilt installation and across geographies and territories. Emily’s recent work, Being Future Being, premiered on Tongva Land in Los Angeles in 2022, and was presented at PICA’s TBA Festival, Bates Dance Festival, Jacob’s Pillow, and Festival TransAmériques, among others. Her large-scale project, Then a Cunning Voice and A Night We Spend Gazing at Stars is an all-night outdoor performance gathering taking place amongst 84 community-hand-made quilts. It premiered in Lenapehoking (NYC) in 2017 and was presented in Zhigaagoong (Chicago) in 2019. She choreographed the Santa Fe Opera production of Doctor Atomic, directed by Peter Sellars in 2018.
Emily’s lectures and writings have been published and commissioned by Playwrights Canada Press, The Routledge Companion to Performance Art, The Open Society University Network’s Center for Human Rights and the Arts, CEC Artslink, The Poetry Project, ArtsLink Australia, unMagazine, Dance Research Journal (University of Cambridge Press); SFMOMA; Transmotion Journal, University of Kent; Movement Research Journal; Pew Center for Arts and Heritage; and the compilation Imagined Theaters (Routledge), edited by Daniel Sack. Emily authored the Decolonization Rider (2020), a document that now serves as a foundation for structural change work in hundreds of cultural institutions across what is called the US.
Emily hosts monthly fires on Mannahatta in partnership with Urban Cree scholar, Kai Recollet. Emily was the Pueblo Opera Cultural Council Diplomat at Santa Fe Opera 2018-2020. She was a lead organizer of First Nations Dialogues, a member of Creative Time’s inaugural Think Tank, a co-compiler of the documents, Creating New Futures: Guidelines for Ethics and Equity in the Performing Arts and Notes for Equitable Funding. Emily served as Social Practice Resident at Kennedy Center for the Arts (2021-2022) and is a Social Practice Artist in Residence at Abrons Arts Center (2019 - present). Emily is co-lead for First Nations Performing Arts.
Catalyst Staff
IV Castellanos, Interkinnector & Production Manager
IV Castellanos is a Mx Indigenous Bolivian/American, an abstract performance artist, sculptor, land defender and water protector in training. Their practice prioritizes skill sharing and creating space for Queer, Trans* and diasporic Indigenous communities and people of color. They create stand-alone sculptures, wall works installations, wearables, and objects for performance. Their studio practice involves a convergence of techniques to create sculptures that highlight labor and effort as meaningful actions. They received the Braiding Seeds Fellowship (2023), an IndieSpace grant (2023), City Arts Corps grant (2021), Franklin Furnace Fund grant (2019), The manage the Land Back Hub Brooklyn for artists and activists along with Build And Reworld Now, in collaboration with choreographer/multidisciplinary artist Emily Johnson of the Yup'ik Nation, which is a space to make, rest, and reflect, situated on Haudenosaunee lands. Continuous projects include the Performance Art Delivery Service and editing books to the correct pronouns of the reader as ongoing forms of resistance and care.
Korina Emmerich, Exhibitions Steward and Materials Caretaker
Artist and designer Korina Emmerich founded the slow fashion brand EMME Studio in 2015. Her colorful work celebrates her patrilineal Indigenous heritage from The Puyallup tribe while aligning art and design with education. With a strong focus on social and climate justice, Emmerich's artwork strives to expose and dismantle systems of oppression in the fashion industry and challenge colonial ways of thinking. She has recently co-founded the new atelier, gallery, showroom, and community space Relative Arts NYC. Located in the East Village. The space celebrates sustainable and subversive indigenous art and fashion. Her work has been featured in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Moma PS1, The Denver Art Museum, Vogue, Elle, Instyle, New York Magazine, and more notable publications. She has presented her collections at Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week, Indigenous Fashion and Arts, Santa Fe Indian Market's Couture Runway Show, and New York Fashion Week.
Anne Pesata, Executive Administrative Steward
Anne is Jicarilla Apache from Dulce, New Mexico. She was raised traditionally by her family on the Jicarilla Apache Reservation, where she grew up with an intrinsic connection among self, land, and culture. With a strong background in Jicarilla traditional arts. She hopes to bring a creative approach to systems support in her role as Catalyst's Executive Administrative Steward. She currently lives in Albuquerque, NM, and is a mother to one.
Leomary Rodriguez, Decolonization Rider Analyst & Strategist
Leomary Rodriguez is an Afro-Taína data analyst, storyteller, and systems strategist who uses quantitative and qualitative insight to support decolonial frameworks. Her work at Catalyst is rooted in kinship, care, and accountability, centering Indigenous sovereignty and Land Back through data-informed approaches that challenge colonial structures. She is committed to using her analytical practice to illuminate patterns, uplift truth, and ground Catalyst’s mission in long-term liberation.
Sara Roer, Managing Director Sara Roer (she/her/hers) hails from Waccamaw land colonially known as Wilmington, North Carolina and since 2005 lives and works on Munsee Lenape and Canarsee lands after asking to be left there on visits to grandparents for at least a decade prior. She currently identifies as an extroverted, non-disabled, cisgender, white queer femme and a settler of mixed European descent. She got an early start dancing as the southern drawling star of many a home video as well as a competitive gymnast before heading North to earn her B.F.A., suma cum laude, at George Mason University. Her life is driven by curiosity and a sense of adventure, with art and equity as deeply rooted constants. Sara has collaborated on sustainable, impactful work with Emily Berry/b3w, Keith A Thompson/danceTactics, This Body collective (as a co-founder), BAX|Brooklyn Arts Exchange, Dance/NYC, and Catalyst / Emily Johnson.
Craig Hensala, Producer
Megan Kendzior, Development Director
Stina Thomas Hamlin, Radio Waves Producer Stina Thomas Hamlin is a 6th-generation Texan of Indigenous and European descent and co-founder of State of Mind Media and co-director of 4th World Media. She is also a post-production supervisor and award-winning director of immersive media based in Lenapehoking. An early maker of Extended Reality (XR), her projects earned awards and funding from Samsung and Google as she broke ground in the field. Over the past 25 years, she has delivered hundreds of projects for film, television, and streaming platforms. She is most inspired when working with creative teams committed to justice, liberation, and care for the Earth.
Nishina Shapwaykeesic-Loft, Assistant Quilt and Materials Caretaker Nishina Shapwaykeesic-Loft is Kanien’kehá:ka from Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory. She is a 2S queer, multi-disciplinary artist in a wide spectrum of mediums. She has a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours from York University in Theatre Production and Design. Nishina works within the theatre industry with a specialization in Costume Design. She is a mural artist with experience as an artist with StART and as a curator and an Indigenous advisor. She works in Programming in the film industry previously for the Toronto Queer Film Festival and ImagineNATIVE Film & Media Arts Festival. Nishina is a beadwork artist based in Brooklyn, focusing on modern designs with traditional materials. She is an emerging fashion designer with a focus in upcycling and traditional motifs from Haudenosaunee patterns. She was the Senior Art Director at Relative Arts NYC.
Branch of Scholarship
Kai Recollet, Urban Cree scholar of a pedagogy of care
Joseph M. Pierce, ᏣᎳᎩᎯ ᎠᏰᎵ Cherokee Nation citizen, writer, curator, lines on fingers, sun circles waiting, water slipping through
Camille Usher, Coast Salish / Sahtu Dene writer, administrator, and artist using running to feel kinship of spatialities
Dylan Robinson, xwélmexw (Stó:lō/Skwah) writer and curator, tl'épstexw tel sqwálewel (making deep or low my thought-feelings / trying to be patient)
Branch of Making
Brandi Norton, Overflow Radio Performer
Brandi Norton (Iñupiaq) is a curator and dancer based in Rhinebeck, New York. She currently works as curator of public programs at Bard’s Center for Indigenous Studies. She holds a BFA in dance from the Juilliard School, and an M.S.Ed in early childhood education from Bank Street Graduate School. She works to bring Indigenous artists, educators and thought leaders to Bard College for public facing events. Before joining the Center for Indigenous Studies, she co-founded the dance company OtherShore, and was a dancer in the Trisha Brown Dance Company for nine seasons. Norton also had the privilege of being an elementary school teacher in New York City.
Michelle Boulé, Overflow Radio Performer
SunRoller, Overflow Radio Stage Manager
Raven Chacon, Diné, Composer
Raven Chacon is a composer, performer and installation artist from Fort Defiance, Navajo Nation. As a solo artist, collaborator, or with Postcommodity, Chacon has exhibited or performed at Whitney Biennial, documenta 14, REDCAT, Musée d’art Contemporain de Montréal, San Francisco Electronic Music Festival, Chaco Canyon, Ende Tymes Festival, 18th Biennale of Sydney, and The Kennedy Center. Every year, he teaches 20 students to write string quartets for the Native American Composer Apprenticeship Project (NACAP). He is the recipient of the United States Artists fellowship in Music, The Creative Capital award in Visual Arts, The Native Arts and Cultures Foundation artist fellowship, and the American Academy’s Berlin Prize for Music Composition. He lives in Albuquerque, NM.
Korina Emmerich, Garment Design
Korina Emmerich has built her Brooklyn-based brand, EMME Studio, on the backbone of Expression, Art and Culture, where items are made-to-order in their studio located on occupied Canarsee territories. She is leading the charge to embrace art and design as one, and weaving it into her brand story. Originally from the Pacific Northwest, her colorful work is known to reflect her patrilineal Indigenous heritage from The Coast Salish Territory, Puyallup tribe. Items are made from upcycled, recycled, and all-natural materials giving respect to the life cycle of a garment from creation to biodegradation. With a strong focus on social and climate justice while speaking out about industry responsibility and accountability: Emmerich works actively to expose and dismantle systems of oppression and challenge colonial ways of thinking. www.emmestudios.com
Ashley Pierre-Louis, Performer
Ashley Pierre-Louis is originally from Miami, FL. She attended New World School of the Arts and later Florida State University, where she graduated with a BFA in dance. She is currently a dance artist and creator freelancing and exploring choreography in New York City. When making, she asks herself and audiences to imagine what our physical, emotional, and psychic expressions of what is deepest and strongest and richest within each of us is, and how we can share them collectively, in order to create a sense of freedom in the mind and body. She currently performs with Shamel Pitts’ multidisciplinary performance collective TRIBE, Emily Johnson/Catalyst Dance, and Edisa Weeks’ DELIRIOUS Dances. She is also the Dream Partner & Program Manager for Florida State University’s Arts in NYC program, as well as the Artist Services Associate for Performance Space New York (PS 122). She has worked as the dramaturg for Shamel Pitts | TRIBE's work Touch of RED & the Associate Choreographer for the play Help (2022) by acclaimed poet and playwright Claudia Rankine. She was named one of Gallim’s 2021 Moving Women spring artist-in-residence & received a professional apprenticeship for the Dance Division at the Juilliard School (2020).
Stacy Lynn Smith, Performer
Stacy Lynn Smith is a neurodivergent, Black multiracial performing artist, choreographer, director and Green Circle Keeper at Hidden Water (by and for those affected by childhood sexual abuse) whose practice synthesizes various lineages of improvisational forms, somatics, experimental theater and butoh. Dedicated to collaboration, Smith creates, devises, improvises and performs across disciplines and genres with an array of talented artists: DeForrest Brown Jr., Anna Homler, Karen Bernard, Thaddeus O’Neil, Rakia Seaborn, Vangeline Theater (2008-2017), Michael Freeman, Saints of an Unnamed Country, Salome Asega, GENG, Donna Costello, Bradley Bailey, Michele Beck, Jasmine Hearn, mayfield brooks, Jill Sigman, Kathy Westwater, Josephine Decker, Emily Johnson, Peter Born, Okwui Okpokwasili and more. Smith's work has been presented at Movement Research at the Judson Church, Socrates Sculpture Park, 92StY, Performance Mix Festival, Snug Harbor Dance Festival, CAVE, St. Augustine's Church via Abrons Arts Center, Rosekill, Glasshouse and more. As Psychic Wormhole (with Alex Romania), Smith is creating their abstract memoir, RECKONING, the duo's first feature film. Smith is a 2022-2024 Movement Research Artist-in-Residence and 2024 Djerassi AIR.
Maggie Thompson, Fond du Lac Ojibwe, Textile Artist and Designer
Maggie Thompson was born and raised in Minneapolis, MN. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Textiles at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in 2013. As a textile artist and designer she derives her inspiration from the history of her Ojibwe heritage, exploring family history as well as themes and subject matter of the broader Native American experience. Thompson’s work calls attention to its materiality pushing the viewer’s traditional understanding of textiles. She explores materials in her work by incorporating multimedia elements such as photographs, beer caps and 3D-printed objects. In addition to her fine arts practice, Thompson runs a knitwear business known as Makwa Studio and is also an emerging curator of contemporary Native art, and has worked on curating special exhibits for Two Rivers Gallery, the McKnight Foundation and the Minnesota Museum of American Art.
Sugar Vendil, Performer
Sugar Vendil (she/they) is a composer, pianist, and interdisciplinary artist who is forging new creative pathways as a second generation Filipinx American and future ancestor. She started her artistic life as a classical pianist, and after spending nearly a decade searching for her own voice, her practice evolved into making music and performances that integrate sound, movement, and unconventional approaches to the piano. She has a keyboard/synth duo, Vanity Project, with composer Trevor Gureckis. Vendil is based in Lenapehoking, known as Brooklyn, where she lives with her partner and toddler, who she hopes will pursue dance and volleyball but will not force him/them. Vendil’s work germinates from a kinesthetic and improvisatory approach rooted in lived experiences. Her sense of physicality and artistic autonomy is evident in her work, whether it is music, performance, or visual scores. Vendil was awarded a 2022 NPN Creation Fund grant and 2021 MAP Fund grant to support Antonym: the opposite of nostalgia, which is being co-commissioned by Living Arts Tulsa, High Concept Labs, and National Sawdust. Antonym is a finalist for NEFA’s NTP Creation and Touring Fund. Commissions include music for 3.1 Phillip Lim’s F/W 2024 show, Simple Tasks 2 on Jennifer Koh’s Grammy-award winning album Alone Together; a Chamber Music America commission to write for The Nouveau Classical Project; ETHEL’s Homebaked 2019, and ACF | Create. She scored films by Jih-E Peng’s May We Know Our Own Strength (2021) and GATHER (2023), both art films centered on works by visual artist Amanda Phingbodhipakkiya, and The Rite of Spring (2024), written and directed by Nick Nocera. In early 2024, her visual scores were part of the National Arts Club’s 2020 Fellows group exhibition, Light, Line, and Sound. She showed two ink-on-paper scores, and trapunto etude (2024), a beaded and embroidered canvas score inspired by the art of Pacita Abad.Vendil loves dancing and collaborating with other makers. She is part of choreographer Emily Johnson/CATALYST’s Being Future Being and was a musical collaborator with treya lam for Marie Lloyd Paspe and Almasphere’s bumalik. Vendil composed the music for Phil Chan’s Ballet des Porcelaines in 2021, and premiered composer-saxophonist Darius Jones’ LawNOrder at The Stone and Being Caged in ICE at Roulette in 2018. This year, she is dancing in Adrienne Westwood’s [ ]. Her album, May We Know Our Own Strength, is out on Gold Bolus Recordings. Vendil is an advocate of the oxford comma, is obsessed with her (late) cat Coco, and has an excellent memory.
Header photo by Maria Baranova