Breaking Barriers through Movement & Dance
Spring 2020
Virtual Workshop
Over 8 weeks Break Barriers through Movement and Dance explored the how to use the principles of modern dance to create and explore pathways toward combatting crisis. The program director Omonike Akinyemi focused particularly on movement stemming from Yoruba African dance, Martha Graham, and Katherine Dunham dance techniques. In each of these weekly online dance/movement workshops was offered to dancers of any age and experience level, Omonike encouraged students to claim their space and also use improvisation to create and transform their sense of the space around them.
During this summer Omonike will continue to teach through her company, Image Quilt, and looks towards staying connected with the dedicated group of dance explorers. Check out the website below for more information about her classes.
Omonike Akinyemi is a passionate filmmaker and choreographer. After performing with the Ballet Hispanico of New York Apprentice Dance Company, she formed Alaafia Dance of Yale University. Omonike holds an MFA in Film Production from the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts. She has produced, written and directed numerous award winning films and theatrical productions including the stageplay, “How to Stay Sane in Paris” (2007), films Nelly's Bodega (2000), and Fatima (2006), and "Opening Doors" (2013).
A two-time Fellow of the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA), Omonike was honored in 2004 with a Fellowship for Screenwriting and again in 2007 with a Fellowship in Filmmaking. While based in France from 1999-2003, Omonike wrote her first episodes of the episodic narrative film series she is producing, “Omo Shango: People Under the Influence of the God of Thunder" and was honored in Paris with the Cinema Images D’Ailleurs “Prix Jeune Cineaste”.
As a part of the Dance for Film team, Omonike created an environment to allow the dance choreographers to approach their work through non-traditional narrative development, a process involving scripting through dance, video editing of rehearsal footage to facilitate the on-set film choreography, recruiting all other creative collaborators, and facilitating engagement between the choreographers, the greater Montclair, New Jersey community, and the university.
As the producer of "Into the Eye of Soliloquy", Omonike also mentored a crew of eight Montclair State University students in the shooting and editing. As a choreographer, Omonike choreographs works utilizing Ballet, African, and Flamenco dance techniques.