I was born into a military family in Honolulu, HI and moved to the Pacific Northwest as a toddler. Already singing and dancing by the age of two, I began my formal dance training at the age of 8 while attending Elk Plain School of Choice, an arts elementary school that allowed me to study all disciplines of dance.

Over the years, my strong passion for music & the arts has given me the opportunity to sing and share the stage with the likes of Sugar Ray, Keith Sweat, (the REAL) Lady-A, Kim Archer and Tiffany Wilson. Singing has also allowed me to perform for the Seattle Seahawks Season Opener and the Make a Wish Foundation.

If you are local to the Seattle area, you may have seen me acting on stage at Village Theatre, Tacoma Musical Playhouse, or ACT Theatre. I’ve also directed and choreographed for Showtunes Theatre Company, Seattle Repertory Theatre, The 5th Avenue Theatre, Village Theatre, Theatre Puget Sound and Tacoma Arts Live.

On this site you will get to see all sides of me. Be it through my words, my music, or my movement, I hope I make you feel something.

Emma Lawes (she/her) is a dancer, educator and producer based between Los Angeles and Seattle. Currently, she is in creation processes with Keyes Wiley (SEA) and Sean Ardor (CA) to premiere in 2025. She is on faculty at Orange County School of the Arts and California School of the Arts SGV, and producing work with CO-, G.U.M. Collective and zoe | juniper. She has presented her own work at Base: Experimental Arts + Space, 10 Degrees Arts + Events, Mutuus Studio and Atwater Village Theater. She is a graduate of the University of the Arts with a BFA in Dance Performance under the direction of Donna Faye Burchfield.

Nicole Flores (they/she) -- Nicole (Nikki) is a movement artist, dance educator, and personal trainer based in Seattle, Washington. Originally from Chicago, Illinois, Nikki received her BFA in Dance from Columbia College Chicago before relocating to Los Angeles in 2018 where she received secondary training from The American Music and Dramatics Academy (AMDA) and performed with Los Angeles Contemporary Dance Company, Psychopomp Dance Theater, and Heidi Duckler Dance. Nikki is a close collaborator with the Artistic Director of Psychopomp, Shenandoah Harris, with whom she co-facilitated three consecutive Psychopomp summer workshops (2020-2023). As a facilitator, Nikki strives to center community-building and somatic awareness in conjunction with strong technical foundations for the dancers they work with.

 Since moving to Seattle in 2021, Nikki has performed works by Coriolis Dance Collective, Dance Undercurrent, and Earthworks Dance. Nikki’s passion for live performance and deep curiosity for humanity in movement ultimately led her to badmarmarDANCE (Marlo Martin, Artistic Director), with whom she currently performs. Nikki is also a dance educator at eXit SPACE and Dance Fremont as well as a NASM certified personal trainer for their business Powerchord Movement. Her belief is that movement, and dance especially, is for everyone, so Nikki does her best to meet each student where they’re at while encouraging a balance between rigor and joy. As a trainer, Nikki focuses primarily on the functionality of the body and how each individual can fine tune their working parts for optimal freedom in everyday life. At home here in Seattle, Nikki is eager to see how dance and life will continue to unfold.  

Kiné Camara is a dance artist and educator based in Seattle, WA, but you can often find her in Paris and Johannesburg as well. 

She began dancing traditional Senegalese styles professionally at 8 years old, and teaching in 2005, under the direction of her father, Master Drummer and Dancer, Ibrahima Camara, of the National Ballet of Senegal. In 2019, she shifted gears to the world of Afro, training in a mix of styles including Afrobeats, Azonto, Ndombolo, Amapiano, and Afrohouse. 

She loves bringing her passion for dance to the stage, and has performed with artists including Uncle Waffles, Asake, Tiwa Savage, Sauti Sol, and Archie. She has also dance and hosted with nightlife events such as the “Tune4Tune” series at Neumos, and “Private Piano” both in collaboration with KEXP DJ, Lace Cadence.

She is currently teaching Amapiano classes, and has taught with organizations like The University of Washington, the University of Florida, Vashon Island Center for the Arts, The Overlake School, The Union Cultural Center, Whatcom Community College and Bellingham Repertory Dance.

Olivia Anderson is a Seattle-based dancer, educator, and stage manager who is continually growing into her own practice and purpose. You may have seen her performing her own work around Seattle, or dancing with companies/artists such as dani tirrell and the Congregation, Keyes Wiley and the NOGOODDOERS, EL SUEÑO, Gansango Dance Company, Malacarne, Chamber Dance Company and badmarmarDANCE, among many others.

She recently began teaching dance at the Seattle Academy of Arts and Sciences and the University of Washington. Olivia is moving through the world with care, intention, and a great curiosity that drives her love of people. 

Ashley Menestrina (she/her) is a movement artist with deep ties to improvisation. She has been performing her own work around the world since 2016. Her solo work, 'The Human Condition: Absent Presence', premiered at The Martha Graham Theater in April 2018 and has since toured in New York City, Los Angeles, Turkey, Mexico City, Portugal, Oklahoma City, and Germany (receiving ‘Best Creation’ Prize at Solocoreografico Festival in both OKC and Frankfurt). Her most recent work, 'Combative Echoes', was originally shown in Thessaloniki, Greece for Die Wolke Art Group’s Unit Motives: GRM festival in 2019, and was accepted into the 24th International Solo-Dance-Thetare Festival Stuttgart in 2020, the 39th Edition of NYC's Battery Dance Festival in 2021, and Seattle International Dance Festival in 2024. She has further worked as a performer/collaborator/choreographer for the following: Manhattanville College (NY), Alice Gosti (Malacarne), Gonzaga University, 5th Ave Theater production of Afterwords, Anna Mlasowsky for the Amazon Artist in Residence program, DX arts department at UW, Emily Schoen Branch, and Maia Melene Durfee.

Majinn  is a queer, disabled, mixed Black dance artist and educator who utilizes their training in multiple dance forms to find and express their whole self. They believe that to be the best dancer and person they can be they need to continuously push their own comfort zone. Majinn works to help guide people in becoming more confident and connected in their bodies, find joy in their movement and be able to speak their voices primarily through Black social dance forms. One of Majinn’s biggest goals in dance is to spread the histories of Black social dance forms in and out of academia so that the cultures are learned and more respected. They also aim to give back to the communities that these art forms were created from through any way they can.  Majinn’s art is for them and the communities they come from, always striving to be authentically themselves in their movement and work You can find Majinn under Majinn_Mike on Instagram

Courses Taught

Genna Carey is an interdisciplinary artist working at the
intersection of dance, choreography, and film. With a BFA in
Dance from Western Michigan University, she integrates her
movement background with cinematic and multimedia elements to
explore new dimensions of storytelling. Her performance career
includes dancing with companies such as Conteur Dance Company
(Toronto, ON) and LED Dance Company (Boise, ID). Genna’s
choreography has been presented on renowned stages, including
the Ailey Theatre, Peridance Capezio Theatre, Center for
Performance Research, and 92nd Street Y in New York. Beyond the
stage, her work has expanded into dance film, where she blends
movement with visual composition. Recent highlights of her film
work include movement direction for Seattle-based musical artist
Yellacatt and an upcoming immersive collaboration with new-media
a r t i s t M a j a P e t r ić. I n a d d i t i o n t o h e r p e r f o r m a n c e ,
choreographic, and film work, Genna is the co-founder of AETHER,
a multidisciplinary arts space that fosters creative
experimentation within both her own practice and the Seattle
community.

Ashley Menestrina (she/her) is a movement artist with deep ties to improvisation. She has been performing her own work around the world since 2016. Her solo work, 'The Human Condition: Absent Presence', premiered at The Martha Graham Theater in April 2018 and has since toured in New York City, Los Angeles, Turkey, Mexico City, Portugal, Oklahoma City, and Germany (receiving ‘Best Creation’ Prize at Solocoreografico Festival in both OKC and Frankfurt). Her most recent work, 'Combative Echoes', was originally shown in Thessaloniki, Greece for Die Wolke Art Group’s Unit Motives: GRM festival in 2019, and was accepted into the 24th International Solo-Dance-Thetare Festival Stuttgart in 2020, the 39th Edition of NYC's Battery Dance Festival in 2021, and Seattle International Dance Festival in 2024. She has further worked as a performer/collaborator/choreographer for the following: Manhattanville College (NY), Alice Gosti (Malacarne), Gonzaga University, 5th Ave Theater production of Afterwords, Anna Mlasowsky for the Amazon Artist in Residence program, DX arts department at UW, Emily Schoen Branch, and Maia Melene Durfee.

Majinn  is a queer, disabled, mixed Black dance artist and educator who utilizes their training in multiple dance forms to find and express their whole self. They believe that to be the best dancer and person they can be they need to continuously push their own comfort zone. Majinn works to help guide people in becoming more confident and connected in their bodies, find joy in their movement and be able to speak their voices primarily through Black social dance forms. One of Majinn’s biggest goals in dance is to spread the histories of Black social dance forms in and out of academia so that the cultures are learned and more respected. They also aim to give back to the communities that these art forms were created from through any way they can.  Majinn’s art is for them and the communities they come from, always striving to be authentically themselves in their movement and work You can find Majinn under Majinn_Mike on Instagram

Courses Taught

Alia Swersky is a movement artist, performer and educator deeply engaged in dance improvisation, durational time-based art, film, site-specific work, and environmental installation. She is an artist and an educator with degrees from Cornish College of the Arts and an MFA in dance from the University of Washington.

Her artistic path over the last two decades has been shaped by this yearning for deep and meaningful connections with people and places. As a co-creator, ritual maker, and a “horizontal” director, Alia seeks to touch others through dance, somatic presence, vulnerability, and fierceness. Her work ranges from full audience participation to intimate acts of One-to-One performances, site-specific dances for film and live performance, as well as durational time-based art that includes physical acts of endurance, repetition, stillness, subtlety, singing, soft energetic grace, abstraction, caricature, and a deconstruction of clichés such as extreme high femme expressions. Her teaching and art-making seek to create practices that embrace endurance on stage and in life as acts of resistance, resilience, release, and beauty. 

As a performer, Alia has also toured nationally and internationally as a member of the LeGendre Performance Group and has performed in the works with many Seattle artists, some of which include The Maureen Whiting Company, Khambatta Dance Company, Jurg Koch, KT Niehoff, and Salt Horse.

As an educator, she has taught at Cornish College of the Arts for sixteen years and in the Seattle community at Velocity’s Strictly Seattle Festival, and the Seattle Festival of Dance Improvisation (SFDI). She was a long time Co-artistic director of Dance Art Group (DAG), a non-profit organization that promotes the practice and appreciation of dance and somatic education in the Seattle area, including the Seattle Festival of Dance Improvisation.