Launch Pad: A Choreographers’ Showcase is a springboard program for choreographers who are at a crossroads of some kind in their careers. This pilot program was engineered in true partnership between The Yard and Headlong—a Philadelphia-based activator of performance research, of cultural inquiry, and of overlapping layers of communities. The Yard and Headlong are partnering to bring three choreographers to residence at The Yard and to provide space, time, fellowship, mentorship, and compensation for their works and help shape new pathways in their choreographic careers.

Headlong is an activator of performance research, cultural inquiry, and overlapping layers of communities. They incubate artist projects and engage audiences by asking people to participate in the work. Headlong fosters the creative eco-system by providing educational opportunities, financial advice and strategic planning as well as by asking the questions that shape the cultures in which we live.

Launch Pad Workshop

Come learn from our Launch Pad Artists-in-Residence! This will be a dance and movement based workshop held in our beautiful open air studio. It is open to adults of all skill levels.

Wednesday, June 7th 10:30-12:30 p.m.

Friday, June 9th 10:30-11:30 a.m. (cancelled)

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Launch Pad: A Conversation on Creativity and Artistic Process

Join us for a moderated discussion with artists-in-residence David Guzman, Marguerite Hemmings, and Sophiann Mahalia as they discuss their creative process, approach to collaboration, and what inspires them to make and move.

Wednesday, June 7th 5:30-7:00 p.m.

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2023 Launch Pad Choreographers (in alphabetical order.)

David Guzman is a cross-disciplinary performer who loves and honors lichens. His durational workshop installation “Treeing” invited passers by to greet urban ecologies through contemplative walks and paper-making from trash. David is a Headlong Performance Institute fellow, a member of Circus Amok as well as Ukrainian Village Voices. He was a 2021 artist-in-residence for “another audience” at Black Hole Hollow, where he also taught a workshop called “Lichen Party!” the following year. His recent credits include Mina Nishimura's "Mapping a Forest While Searching for an Opposite Term of Exorcist" at Jacob's Pillow and Danspace Project, Aaron Landsman’s “Night Keeper” at BAC and The Chocolate Factory Theater, Circus Amok’s “Escape to New York”, Cathy Weis’s “Props from Poughkeepsie: Hunger and Restraint” at Sundays on Broadway, Bread and Puppet Theater's “The Persians”, Gregory Corbino’s “Murmurations”, Great Small Works' “Eggplant Ramadan”, and a workshop of Cunningham’s “Double Toss” through the Merce Cunningham Trust. David is currently the Russian-English translator of Isadorino Gore’s “Experiments in Choreology, or Where the Soviet Gesture Has Led Us”, a kaleidoscopic dance manual that excavates the legacy of early Soviet contemporary dance. He is the personal assistant to choreographers Ishmael Houston-Jones and Cathy Weis.

Bennington College 21’

Instagram: @lichen_lover

Marguerite Angelica Monique Hemmings is a performance artist/educator currently based in Philadelphia, USA. They focus on one's own body, one's own way of moving, and connecting to the unseen. They are a master of body ceremonies and a curator of vibes. As a choreographer they specialize in emergent, improvisational and social dance movement styles and technologies, rooted in the story of the African Diaspora. They are researching the ancestral and subversive role of dance and the dancer throughout the African Diaspora and look to conjure these technologies through all of their (present) work. Marguerite uses body, text, media, and moving images in their work.

Website: wefreeee.com

Instagram: @margueriteangelicamonique

Sophiann Mahalia, currently a Philadelphia Artist, moved from Hartford, Connecticut to receive her BFA in Dance Choreography and Performance from Temple University. Sophiann graduated Summa Cum Laude and had the honor of being the recipient of the Rose Vernick Most Promising Performers Award.

Sophiann’s dance credentials include Equilibrium Dance Theatre, D2D: Dare To Dance, and Kariamu and Company: Traditions. She has trained under Lee Aca Thompson, who has influenced artists such as Michael Peters choreographer for Michael Jackson’s Thriller, and Dr. Kariamu Welsh, creator of the Umfundalai technique. She has studied West African, Modern, Ballet, Hip hop, Waacking, and Umfundalai with AQiida Gilbert, Dara Stevens Meredith, Dr. Kariamu Welsh, Jillian Harris, Jolet Creary, Kun Yang Lin, Laura Katz Rizzo, Lee Aca Thompson, and Stephen Hankey.

Her recent works include the Gilead’s commercial campaign “Press Play”, Black & Mild commercial shoot, and music video Clarity for singing artist Saleka Night Shyamalan directed by Ishani Shyamalan and M. Night Shyamalan. Alongside this, she was one of the featured dancers for Ari Lennox’s Shea Butter Baby music video featuring J Cole. In the commercial world, Sophiann has had the opportunity to do work for companies such as BOMBAS, gone on tour with the Clothesline Muse starring six-time nominated jazz singer Nnenna Freelon and performed in New Freedom Theatre’s Black Nativity directed by Rajendra Maroon Maharaj.

She promotes body positivity and strongly uses dance to tell the story that can’t be understood with just words, but movement. Sophiann Mahalia explores dance through her own experiences of the black dancing body by using her fusion of African, hip hop, and waacking to promote the limitless and regal qualities of womanhood within the black dancing body. She aspires to inspire other artists to take their artistry to the next level as she does the same.

Website: www.sophiannmahalia.com

Instagram: @sophiannmahalia

For more on Headlong please visit

Website: headlong.org

If planning to attend a performance or class please review our Covid and Box Office policies.

Photo Credit: Backstage at The Yard by Harrison Burke