O.Dela Arts supports the research, creation, production, and touring of creative activities, choreography, and installations and provides the platform for educational and community projects offered by Artistic Director, Olivia C. Davies. O.Dela Arts values generosity, integrity, and an openness to learn. The mandate of O.Dela Arts Society is to support Canadian Indigenous choreographer, Olivia C. Davies, (Anishinaabe) in the creation and production of choreography, community-engaged projects, creative collaboration projects and commissions. Since its inception in 2018, O.Dela Arts’ programming seeks to develop audiences for Contemporary Indigenous dance and multidisciplinary arts. The organization has built a solid foundation of peer exchange, professional development opportunities and performance series. In celebration of Indigenous women dancing stories of transformation and coinciding with National Indigenous Peoples’ Day, we curated the first Matriarchs Uprising Festival in June 2019 to showcase works by Indigenous choreographers from Australia, Canada, and the US. The events solidified our goals of becoming an organization that supports multiple voices and visions through our artistic curation. 

In this circle conversation setting, we invite listeners to sit in circle and hold space for women to speak our truth about the ways our creative acts connect us to our communities, help define our worldview, and communicate our dreams for the future. Talking Truths: Circle Conversation extends new ways of viewing Indigenous and Community art as an act of healing, political assertion, and cultural continuation. These events are curated by O.Dela Arts, Artistic Director, Olivia C. Davies to engage audiences in new learning about the nuances of Contemporary creative performance, storytelling, dance and song.

Olivia C. Davies is a dance artist, choreographer, community-arts facilitator and emerging writer of Anishinaabe, French-Canadian, Finnish and Welsh heritage. Davies’ works often explore the emotional and political relationships between people and places. Her recent choreographic explorations are driven by a desire to explore neo-traditional aspects of her Indigeneity, story-weaving, and collaborative projects that bring about new awareness of the world around us.

Davies formally trained at York University and was an apprentice with Body Narratives Collective, Raven Spirit Dance and Starrwind Dance Projects and collaborated with Diane Roberts (Arrivals Legacy Project) in developing community-engagement facilitation skills. She is a founding member of the MataDanze Collective (2005), Circadia Indigena Aboriginal Arts Collective (2016), and Crow’s Nest Collective (2016). Davies was artist in residence at The Dance Centre  for the 2018-2019 season where she curated the inaugural CoexisDance Western Edition and Matriarchs Uprising festival. The festival was co-presented in 2020 with Talking Stick Festival and continues to provide new context for Contemporary Indigenous dance with online presentations and showcases.

Davies’ choreography transmits narrative. She has collaborated with Canadian spoken word artists Julie Peters (I Want, 2018) and Melissa Frost (Gidaashi, 2019, Wishing Well, 2020), and with award-winning author Carmen Aguirre to adapt the short story Open Fire (2015). Davies combined forces with celebrated Coast Salish storyteller Rosemary Georgeson to create Crow’s Nest and Other Places She’s Gone (2017) exploring the shifting landscapes of refuge and dispossession experienced by Indigenous women. Directions (2018) activated the garden stage of a private residence in East Vancouver, while Kichissipi Love (2019) activated the banks of the Ottawa River; each work building on a solid foundation of site-specific performances that subvert the audience gaze to revel in the world of land-based dance and ritual.

Davies’ community-engagement practice includes facilitation of Home: Our Way dance and story-weaving workshops, Healthy Aging Through The Arts, and collective creation labs. Davies facilitates spaces for movers to find their unique expression of personal legacy. Her work has been presented across Canada since 2004. She has been supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, British Columbia Arts Council, and the First Peoples Cultural Council. To learn more about her company, collaborations and projects, please visit www.oliviacdavies.ca

Photo by Dayna Szyndrowski.

Starr Muranko is a dancer/choreographer & Artistic Associate with Raven Spirit Dance. Her work has been presented at the Dance Centre/Dance in Vancouver, Dancing on the Edge, Talking Stick Festival, Crimson Coast Dance and the Weesageechak Festival. She is a proud member of the Dancers of Damelahamid touring across Canada and internationally to New Zealand, Peru and Ecuador.

She holds a BFA in Dance (SFU’s School for Contemporary Arts) and has presented her research at the World Indigenous People’s Conference in Education (WIPCE), Dance Alliance of the Americas and has served as a past board member of the Dance Centre and CADA/WEST.

As a dance educator she has taught dance through the Native Education College, Roundhouse Community Arts Centre, ArtsStarts and the Vancouver Aboriginal Friendship Centre, as well as in the communities of Moose Factory and Attawapiskat in Northern Ontario.  Starr and her family on her Mother’s side are from the Moose Cree First Nation and she celebrates her mixed ancestry of Cree, French and German in all of her work.

Photo by Melanie Orr.

Maura García (non-enrolled Cherokee/Mattamuskeet) is a dancer, choreographer and the artistic director of Maura Garcia Dance. Both as a soloist and with ensembles, she has performed throughout North America, notably at:

• La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club (NY, USA)
• Dance Centre (BC, Canada)
• Woodland Cultural Centre (ON, Canada)
• Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art (AR, USA)

In addition to dance for the stage and screen, Maura choreographs for the outdoors and in response to specific places. She is particularly interested in creating stunning performance that is accessible, sustainable and has a low carbon foot print.

About Maura Garcia Dance:
Maura Garcia Dance inspires audiences to liberate themselves through vibrant performances that uplift Indigenous cultural values and harness the sensual rhythms of the natural world. From stages to music videos to the outdoors, Maura Garcia Dance creations reflect the power of stories to form and change our realities

www.mauragarciadance.org
linktr.ee/mauragarciadance
www.youtube.com/user/mauragarciadance
@maura_garcia_dance

Jessica McMann is a Cree (Cowessess, SK) musician, contemporary dancer and choreographer. She is also a classically trained flutist, with a Bachelor of Music from the University of Calgary. She has successfully defended her thesis for her MFA  – Contemporary Arts at Simon Fraser University in 2019.  Her recent compositions and soundscapes explore Indigenous identity and history. She is also co-founder and co-director Wild Mint Arts, an Indigenous arts company. Her first album “Incandescent Tales” will be released in early 2021.

She has been dancing fancy shawl, jingle and hoop dance for 17 years, and has had the opportunity to present contemporary and traditional work at festivals across western Canada, and tour northern Europe. Currently her personal experience, Two-Spirit identity, Cree and Blackfoot language, and the strength of Indigenous women guide her current contemporary dance work. She works regularly with Elijah Wells, a Blackfoot animator to bring the stories of Transgender, Two-Spirit and Queer persons alive.

Her recent Musician artist-in-residence at the Banff Center for the Arts resulted in an Indigenous classical CD recording with Beverley McKiver in the fall of 2019. Jessica’s work has been shown by Made in BC (2018, 2019, 2020) and at Fairy Tales Film Festival (2012, 2020), Matriarch Uprising (2019), Vancouver International Children’s’ Festival (2018), Vancouver International Jazz Festival  (2018), AlterNative: IndigiQueer (2017), IndigeDIV (2017, 2019), Talking Stick Festival (Vancouver 2012, 2013, 2020) Kootenay Cultural Festival (2012, 2015, 2016) , ASTAM; Cree Festival (2012), Coastal First Nations Dance Festival (2011,2012, 2014, 2017, 2018) Vancouver Queer Film Festival (2011), Q the Arts Festival (2011), and 7a*11d (2010). “Too Good; That MAY Be”, an immersive soundscape movement performance was shown at the Urban Shaman Gallery in Winnipeg as part of “The 60’s Scoop; A place between” in 2017.  She has also toured in Sweden, Netherlands, and Belgium. She has created soundtracks for the ITWE Collective, performed with the Ambrose University Chamber Orchestra and the Foothills Philharmonic Orchestra, and was a guest musician for Arcade Fire at the Junos and regularly with Laura Vinson and the Free Spirit. Her collaborative visual arts work with Elijah Wells are in the permanent collections at the Pitt Rivers museum in Oxford, UK. She also is a dance artist in Calgary schools.

www.jessicamcmann.com

Michelle Olson is a member of the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in First Nation and the Artistic Director of Raven Spirit Dance. She studied dance and performance at the University of New Mexico, the Aboriginal Arts Program at the Banff Centre and was an Ensemble Member of Full Circle First Nations Performance.  Michelle works in areas of dance, theatre and opera as a choreographer, performer and movement coach and her work has been seen on stages across Canada. Selected choreography/theatre credits include Gathering Light (Raven Spirit Dance), Salmon Girl (TYA – Raven Spirit Dance), Map of the Land, Map of the Stars (Gwaandak Theatre), Frost Trees Exploding Moon (Raven Spirit Dance), Mozart’s Magic Flute (Vancouver Opera), The Ecstasy of Rita Joe (Western Canada Theatre/National Arts Centre), Death of a Chief (Native Earth Performing Arts/National Arts Centre) and Evening in Paris (Raven Spirit Dance). She was the recipient of the inaugural Vancouver International Dance Festival Choreographic Award.  She graduated as a Certified Movement Analyst from Laban/Bartenieff and Somatic Studies Canada and is currently teaching at Langara’s Studio 58 and the UBC Theatre Department.  She penned her first short play “Becoming” for Embodying Power and Place, a project spearheaded by New Harlem Productions and Nightwood Theatre.

Santee Smith (Tekaronhiáhkhwa/Picking Up The Sky) is a multidisciplinary artist from the Kahnyen’kehàka Nation, Turtle Clan, Six Nations of the Grand River. Transformation, energetic exchange and creating mind-heart connections through performance is her lifelong work. Santee trained at Canada’s National Ballet School; holds Physical Education and Psychology degrees from McMaster University and a M.A. in Dance from York University. Premiering her first production Kaha:wi – a family creation story in 2004, one year later she founded Kaha:wi Dance Theatre which has grown into an internationally renowned company. Santee approaches her life and work in a sacred manner and the importance of sharing our gifts with others. Through her Onkwehonwe’neha creative process, Santee’s work speaks to identity and humanity, role and responsibility of artists in community. She is a sought-after teacher and speaker on the performing arts, Indigenous performance and culture. Smith is the 19th Chancellor of McMaster University.

www.kahawidance.org
@kahawidance
@santeesmith