March 26: Mujeres Empoderadas

Dance Mission Theater x Loco Bloco x PODER SF presents
Mujeres Empoderadas

Sunday, March 26, 1-3pm
FREE at Hummingbird Farm (1645 Geneva, Crocker Amazon Park, SF)

Dance Mission, Loco Bloco, and PODER SF are coming together once more to celebrate Women’s History Month. Join us for this free, outdoor dance and music festival featuring work by Loco Bloco, La Mezcla, Karen Smith, Shahrzad Dance, La Familia Peña-Govea, Meche Ita, F.A.L. Dance, and Fredrika Keefer.

Recommended to bring a blanket and a chair.

Show is free, but donations are encouraged. Suggested donation, $5-$25. 100% of donations go directly back to the artists.

***

MUJERES EMPODERADAS PROGRAM LINEUP

PERFORMERS

Karen A. Smith and the Odoiya Women’s Chorus
@kasmitdancer

Karen A. Smith is a talented lifelong vocalist who sings with a wide variety of cultural groups around the Bay Area and beyond. Joining her is the Odoiya Women’s Chorus, a choral group that emerged from Brasarte’s Annual Yemanja Festival.  The amazing multi-talented members of this group are from all walks of life and is composed of teachers, dancers, singers, mothers, percussionists, system analysts, and more!! We are empowered women and looking forward to celebrating the Power of Women.

Odoiya Women’s Chorus: Sarah Daniels, Jessica Fernandez, Sharon D. Henderson, Laurie Lenrow, Kimberly Moore, Lou Pearson, Holly Shogbesan, Andrea Valverde

Daniela Garcia-Piedra
@danielaig49

Daniela Garcia-Piedra is a San Francisco native, latina dance educator, and artivist. Garcia spotlights afro-latine traditions using authentic dance practices, community engagement and performance to underprivileged youth. Since 2010 Garcia has danced with free non-profit youth programs where she learned styles such as Samba, afro brazilian, hip hop and many more. Garcia currently works teaching dance classes to 3-14 year old youth throughout the Bay Area with Dance Mission, Rising Rhythm, and the Performing Arts Workshop. Garcia’s influence stems from the racism, social and systemic oppression the Latinx community faces today. Her goal is to empower youth to use their experience and bodies as a catalyst for breaking generational traumas and creating revolutionary change.

Laurie Fleurentin and F.A.L. Dance
@fleur.laurie

Laurie Fleurentin is a Native Haitian dancer, choreographer, singer, and dance teacher, born and raised in Haiti, who is proud of her heritage and culture and wants to share it through arts. She has taught dance for over 20 years to everyone of any age. Her teaching style encompasses bringing the joy of dance to everyone. Laurie Fleurentin believes her “life is dance,” and the key to education is dance.

La Mezcla
@la_mezclasf

La Mezcla is a polyrhythmic, multidisciplinary San Francisco-based dance and music ensemble rooted in Chicana, Latina and Indigenous traditions and social justice. Founded in 2014 by Dance/USA Artist Fellow Vanessa Sanchez, their work brings together Tap dance, Son Jarocho and Afro-Caribbean rhythms to bring the often unseen histories and experiences of communities of color to stages, streets and fields.

Meche Ita

Meche Ita was born and raised in San Franciscan, singer-songwriter, and aerialist.  His song lyrics are often about social-political issues.  As for her musical style, she draws inspiration from her Latin and American roots. Their music is a testament to their bicultural upbringing, vibrant artistic community, and the colorful street music that played in the streets.

Shahrzad Khorsandi
@Shahrzad_Khorsandi

Shahrzad is an Iranian-born dancer and choreographer with a masters degree in Creative Arts from SFSU. She is the artistic director of Shahrzad Dance Academy and Shahrzad Dance Company, and teaches and performs internationally. Shahrzad is also a teaching artist for Youth in Arts and Young Imaginations. She is the author of the book, The Art of Persian Dance, and a member of an international research team, studying the effects of dance on the psyche and the brain. shahrzadance.com + facebook.com/shahrzaddancecompany

Loco Bloco
@locoblocosf

Loco Bloco’s mission is to promote San Francisco youth’s healthy transition into adulthood by engaging them in the creation and performance of music, dance, and theater rooted in Afro-Latinx traditions. Loco Bloco encourages its youth to use multicultural art forms as a tool for their own empowerment and as a catalyst to help them overcome discrimination and bring about change in their communities.

La Familia Peña-Govea

La Familia Peña-Govea is a long time fixture in San Francisco’s music community.  Parents Susan and Miguel and daughters René and Cecilia are all singers/multi-instrumentalists, composers, and teachers.  They each lead their own artistic projects and frequently come together to share their unique family gift of music making for community events.

HONOREE

Pam Tau Lee

Pam Tau Lee is a co-founder of the Asian Pacific Environmental Network, Chinese Progressive Alliance and Just Transition Alliance, where she is also a board director. An elder with more than 40 years in the fight for social justice, Pam continues this work mentoring and supporting a new generation of young leaders. She retired after 20 years from the Center for Occupational and Environmental Health at the University of California at Berkeley and 10 years as an organizer with the Hotel Employees Restaurant Employees (HERE) Union Local 2. Her lifelong movement building efforts are rooted in San Francisco’s Chinatown, where she lived in a densely populated single-room occupancy with her grandmother–who worked in a garment factory and was the inspiration of three decades in the struggle for better working and living conditions for people of color and low-income communities. Pam is internationally known for her community-based participatory action research conducted with hotel room cleaners across the U.S. and Canada and San Francisco’s Chinatown restaurant workers. Findings from these studies led to landmark policy changes in the workplace. In 1991, Pam participated in the first People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit and contributed to the Principles of Environmental Justice. She continues to organize from the local to the global for Environmental Justice, in solidarity with communities affected from San Francisco to the rest of the world.

EMCEE

Christine Joy Amagan Ferrer (a.k.a Tine)
@tinejoy

Christine Joy Amagan Ferrer (a.k.a. Tine or tinejoy) is the creatress of Eyes Opened (EO), eomvmnt.org. And creator, author and designer of The Divine Coloring Book. Tine is a multidisciplinary creative soul from San Francisco. Learning to master nothing but herself. She is a curator of sacred wellness, cultural arts practitioner and healing arts facilitator. Rooted in Philippine, Haitian and Afro-Brazilian folkloric music and dance. Spirituality, folklore, indigenous art forms and rhythms across diasporas, of Spirit ground her.  By day, she has been empowering youth through movement arts for over a decade. By night, she is also a freelance designer and media producer. She delivers solutions for community organizations and individuals acting for the greater collective. Through visual, written and embodied storytelling, she uses movement, media and design to help others tell their stories. Tine is also the educational program coordinator for Robert Moses Kin. “I believe, if we face ourselves, we can heal ourselves and ignite the sacred power within.” – Tine