On June 9-15, DISCO RIOT will present the third year of San Diego’s only queer-focused movement-arts festival, Queer Mvmnt Fest. Under the direction of queer dance artists, Desiree Cuizon and Trystan Merrick, this festival highlights the work of BIPOC artists within the 2SLGBTQIA+ community in centering the need for addressing inequity through an intersectional lens.

As a part of World Design Capital, Queer Mvmnt Fest 2024 will feature cross-border collaborations with queer artists in Tijuana, Mexico. Throughout the week, artists present and share in a variety of formats including classes/workshops, performances, panel discussions, and movement-based short films. Visit https://discoriot.org/qmf24/ for this years' schedule!

WerkOUT in the Park

Queer Mvmnt Fest Opening Celebration 

SUNDAY, JUNE 9 @ 1-7PM

Please join us for the first event of the 2024 Festival: a celebratory day to learn some dance together, watch young queer artists perform, and enjoy the park outside of the annex in community! The performance features Chrysalis Dance Crew from the Monarch School, students from BalletCenter Studios, and emerging artists: Jenna Wu-Cardona, Rebecca Lee, and Christina Madueño-Delgado. Workshops will cover Whacking, Punking, and Bachata basics! Let’s celebrate queer youth and the magical art of dance! This is a FREE event. Please RSVP if you are planning to make it out, so we can plan for your attendance. 

This event is ADA accessible. DISCO RIOT is committed to accessibility and holds with great care the needs of our entire community, especially those who are disabled. We encourage you to contact Alyssa Rose, Program Coordinator (email: operations@disoriot.org) regarding any specific accommodation needs.

Schedule for the event:
☆ 1-2pm: Get settled & mingle.

☆ 2 - 3:30pm: Punking and Whacking: A Queer SoCal Dance Workshop with Era James

☆ 4-5pm: Performances by youth & emerging artists

☆ 5-6pm: Bachata Basics Workshop with Anacristina Ramirez
 

Workshops

Punking and Whacking: A Queer SoCal Dance Workshop with Era James

Punking/Whacking a dance art form created in West Hollywood in the 1970’s today is globally recognized as a prominent club style seen at competitions, battles and other dance platforms everywhere. Learn history, exercises, drills and explore in this dance that is centered around confidence, storytelling, and powerful arm movements. This workshop is for everyone.

Manila born and San Diego raised, Era is an artist and community leader specializing in dance. For nearly 20 years, Era has been fortunate to be a part of numerous dance teams and organizations throughout California including Culture Shock San Diego where she is currently a work study program coordinator, instructor and troupe member. Era has also started a grassroots performing arts organization named The Healing Arts Embassy a.k.a. THAE that hoping to bring healing and life sustainability to artists through the use of education, opportunities and resources. In recent years she has focused training in arts forms such as hip hop, whacking, house and other street and club styles.

 Bachata Basics Workshop with Anacristina Ramirez

Fundamentals of bachata body movement, musicality, and footwork. This workshop is for everyone.

Anacristina is a Latin dance instructor, dancer and choreographer in San Diego. Growing up in a Cuban/Puerto Rican household she has a strong background in Latin music and art. Anacristina teaches weekly classes in salsa and bachata and directs a few performance teams. She is passionate for the culture and the art and loves to go out social dancing.

Performances by:

Chrysalis Dance Crew is co-created by Monarch students and dance teaching artists Sam Marcial and Kaylin Infante. Sam is a multi-disciplinary artist & dance teacher in SD who has been working in CYD spaces since she was 16. Kaylin is a dancer & teaching artist from Hawaii with a background in social work and is the Co-Director of Future Shock at Culture Shock San Diego. @thechyrsalis_monarch

BalletCenter Studios specializes in holistic ballet training focused on the individual needs of our students. We develop our dancers at an appropriate pace for their level of understanding, development, and dance goals by basing class placement on a student's progress and abilities rather than age. Receive serious training in Ballet and Contemporary dance in a loving and forward thinking environment. https://www.balletcenterstudios.com/ @balletcenterstudios

Christina Madueño-Delgado (she/her) received her Bachelor of Arts in Dance from San Jose State University. She has been a dancer since the age of four, taking classes at a local studio while also teaching herself technique off of the internet. Her career as a choreographer has been dedicated to the exploration of the self after trauma. She is currently emerging from hiatus as a performer after taking the past few years to teach the next generation of dancers. Now, she lives in the Imperial Valley. She is always searching for her next source of inspiration by voraciously listening to music. Christina is passionate about accessibility in dance and hopes to help widen dancers’ access to educational materials. @aka.tina

Jenna Wu-Cardona (they/them/she) is an artist, dancer, and educator whose multiracial and queer identity is a lens for everything they learn and create. They envision dance communities and spaces as accessible and supportive areas of play, exploration, and freedom dreaming. After growing up in the Bay Area, they graduated from Scripps College in Claremont, CA with a B.A. in Education and a dance minor. There, they performed works by choreographers Kevin Williamson and Suchi Branfman, and has performed otherwise for Lillian Barbeito, Alex Ketley, and Shenandoah Harris, among others. They currently dance with Blue 13 Dance Company and are a (R )evolution Mentee with DISCO RIOT. Jenna’s choreography has been described as “virtuosic works of art that embodies complex rhythms and vocabularies in a myriad of spatial pathways and configurations.” In addition to being a performance artist, they are also a visual artist with their own small business (ig: @jwc.glance) as a stained glass artist!

Rebecca Lee (she/her) is a dance artist and writer originally from Las Vegas, Nevada. Upon graduating with her BFA in dance from the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University, she moved to Los Angeles to continue her career. Since her move, she has worked for companies such as Heidi Duckler Dance, BrockusRED, and TORRENT. Rebecca’s writing career has taken off with recent publications in Silent Spark Press Poetry along with writing for the LA Dance Chronicle. Rebecca has been able to perform nationally and internationally at events like New York Fashion Week, the FITICH festival in Chile, and throughout Europe. Rebecca has performed work with renowned artists such as Kyle Abraham, Ching-Ching Wong, Peter Chu, Danielle Agami, Sidra Bell, Yin-Yue, and Sonya Tayeh. Choreographically, Rebecca values self expression which is why she plans to continue to use dance as a tool to challenge social constructs of race, gender, and socio-political issues. rebeccaleemoves.org @_rebecca_lee