Born and raised in Barbados, Valencia James studied modern dance in Budapest, Hungary and had the opportunity to perform work by some of the world’s most adventurous choreographers in international venues. However, it wasn’t until she started asking questions about what role artificial intelligence might play in shaping the future of the performing arts that she truly found her passion. Today Valencia works with innovative technologists and scientists to create collaborative performance pieces that blur the boundary between artificial intelligence and the human performer and that hint at how different the experience of performance may be for future artists and audiences alike. She and her collaborators have presented their research and AI-infused work at conferences all over the world. Two days after this interview, dancing in front of a camera in her home in Redwood City, CA, she premiered a brand-new live immersive piece titled “Suga’: A Live Virtual Dance Performance” in the New Frontier exhibition of the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, proving that the worlds of film and live performance are very much already blending. In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, Valencia explains how her work with technology has influenced her creativity and how an ethos of accessibility is proving useful in guiding her and her collaborators on their exploratory forays. https://festival.sundance.org/program/#new-frontier-info/61ae1eff14aef7791a1c579b https://valenciajames.com/ https://volumetricperformance.com/ Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Sahba Aminikia is an Iranian American composer, musician and educator based in San Francisco whose own musical training spanned three continents. He first studied composition in the city of his birth, Tehran, and then relocated to Russia to attend the St. Petersburg State Conservatory. After emigrating as a refugee to San Francisco in 2006, Sahba then earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. His passion for blending genres and cultural influences in his work — he is as well-versed in traditional music from Iran and classical music from Europe as he is in the oeuvres of Pink Floyd and Queen — quickly garnered attention from musicians and ensembles all over the world. Among the performing groups to have commissioned him are Kronos Quartet, Brooklyn Youth Chorus and Symphony Parnassus, and his compositions have been performed all over the world. Sahba is also the founder and artistic director of the annual Flying Carpet Children Festival that since 2018 has been bringing music — and world-class musicians — as well as circus arts to the Turkish border city of Mardin to delight and engage refugee children from Iraq and Syria. In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, Sahba explains how his own experience as refugee has informed his belief that music is a form of spiritual liberation with the unique ability to unite peoples and cultures across all borders. https://www.sahbakia.com/ https://www.flyingcarpetfestival.org/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxDN8k63jJM Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Davian Robinson’s artistic journey has never followed a straight line. As a student at the Governor Morehead School for the Blind in Raleigh, NC, he discovered ballet and tap, launching a lifelong relationship with dance even as his vision continued to fade. At the same time, he was excelling in competitive athletics, eventually earning medals on the national stage as a para-cyclist. Years later, he returned to dance at UNC Charlotte, where he recommitted to the artform that had first taught him how to express his strength and resilience through movement. Since then, Robinson has emerged as both a powerful performer and an advocate for more inclusive ways of teaching and experiencing dance. His “Sensory Beyond Sight” workshop encourages participants — whether artists, athletes or professionals far outside the arts — to move beyond vision and tap into the body’s other senses. He also continues to expand his creative reach through collaboration, most recently with celebrated multimedia artist Janet Biggs in “Misregistration,” on view through September 22, 2025, at the Bechtler Museum of Modern Art in Charlotte. In this interview, Davian reflects on how he developed his methodology as a dance student, the breakthroughs that shaped his teaching and choreography philosophy and how the world of dance can make itself more welcoming to visually impaired dancers and audiences alike. https://www.empower23.net/about Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Few artists have woven their creative practice so seamlessly into the fabric of their home place as Shanai Matteson. A visual artist, writer, community-based researcher and environmental-justice organizer, Shanai works in northern Minnesota’s rural Aitken County, where she was born and raised. Her projects — whether they take the form of printmaking, collaborative public art, documentary storytelling or social gathering spaces — are grounded in reciprocity, ecological care and the conviction that creativity can help repair the frayed relationships between people, land and water. Over the past two decades, Shanai has co-founded and led some of the region’s most inventive and socially engaged cultural initiatives. Her celebrated Water Bar & Public Studio has invited thousands in her community and around the state to “belly up” for a free tasting flight of water while discussing water equity and environmental health with scientists, activists and even policymakers. Her mobile mine-view platform, Overburden/Overlook, offers overlooked histories and community perspectives on the extractive industries that have shaped the Iron Range. And her newest collaboration, Fire in the Village — co-led with Anishinaabe artist Annie Humphrey — bridges Native and non-Native communities through art, music and the radical act of gathering around metaphorical and literal shared fires.  In this interview, Shanai reflects on what it means to create art that belongs to a place and its people, how frontline activism reshaped her approach to community organizing and why persistence matters more than perfection. She also shares lessons from years of linking art, science and public policy and explains why, in her corner of rural Minnesota, tending to one another may be our surest path to a more just and sustainable future. https://shanai.work/ Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

José Ome Navarrete Mazatl is the co-artistic director of NAKA Dance Theater in San Francisco, CA. Since he and fellow dancer Debby Kajiyama founded NAKA in 2001, the company has worked with a wide array of communities in the Bay Area as well as internationally to explore urgent social-justice issues. Among the communities and organizations with whom NAKA has partnered to create performance projects over the years are the Eastside Arts Alliance, a cultural and empowerment space for Black youth in East Oakland; Mujeres Unidas y Activas, a social- and economic-justice organization of Latina immigrant women; and Skywatchers, a group that works with formerly unhoused residents of San Francisco’s Tenderloin district to center their urgent concerns. NAKA has presented and discussed its work all over the world, including at the Hemisphere Institute’s 2007 Encuentro in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and in 2008 and 2014 as the San Francisco representative in SCUBA’S multi-state tours. José was a 2018 U.S.-Japan Creative Artists Fellow, a 2019 Dance/USA Artist Fellow, and just this year, José was one of only six choreographers to receive a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship. In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, José describes how the always surprising and often unpredictable input of the community members with whom he works has made him a more nimble, inventive and impactful artist. http://nakadancetheater.com/ Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

In 2012, theater-maker Evan Weissman founded Warm Cookies of the Revolution, a civic health club in Denver, CO. What exactly is a civic health club? Warm Cookies’ own description can’t be beat: “Well, you go to a gym to exercise your physical health, a religious institution to exercise your spiritual health, and a therapist to exercise your mental health. Warm Cookies of the Revolution is where you go to exercise your Civic Health.” Since Warm Cookies’ founding, Evan and his team have found evermore inventive and entertaining ways to introduce citizens —particularly those who are not traditionally decision-makers, such as young people, recent immigrants and those with fewer resources — to the many ways in which they can participate in and contribute to the civic planning that shapes their communities. Through over 150 unique programs and a jam-packed schedule of ongoing activities, Warm Cookies of the Revolution has convinced thousands of Denver residents to raise their voice on civic issues from neighborhood development to the use of tax dollars and the needs of aging populations. All along the way, they have also lived up to their name by treating their community to mountains of cookies and oceans of milk.   Evan’s work has earned him national and statewide recognition. Evan was selected as a 2019 Roddenberry Fellow for innovative activism as well as a 2019 Livingston Fellow from Bonfils-Stanton Foundation. He was awarded the 2019 Colorado Governor’s Award for Creative Leadership and the 2018 Parr Widener Civic Leadership Award from the Denver Foundation. Evan was Denver Commissioner for Cultural Affairs in 2017 and Creative in Residence at the Denver Art Museum in 2015. In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, Evan reveals how the ethos that first guided him as a theater artist led him to become a community leader who has figured out how to make civic engagement as fun as it is essential. https://www.warmcookiesoftherevolution.org/ https://buntport.com/ Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Danielle Villasana is an independent photojournalist whose documentary work focuses on human rights, gender, displacement, and health with a focus on Latin America.   Her work has earned her widespread recognition. She is a National Geographic Explorer, Magnum Foundation awardee, Women Photograph grantee, and an International Women's Media Foundation fellow, and her photographs have been included in solo and group exhibits and have been published in National Geographic, The New York Times, and the Washington Post, among others. She is a member of Women Photograph and Ayün Fotógrafas, a collective of women photographers united by Latin America that is in partnership with NOOR, the global journalism collective. Danielle is also an activist who strongly believes in the power photography can have when paired with education and community development. In 2017 she co-founded We, Women, an ongoing platform exploring crucial issues across the U.S. through photo-based community engagement projects by women and gender-nonconforming artists. In 2016 she joined The Everyday Project's Community Team, where she helps conceive and work on various initiatives and group photography projects. In 2018 she joined the Authority Collective as a board member. Most recently in 2020 she helped co-author the Photo Bill of Rights, which works to push for a more inclusive, diverse and equitable visual media industry.   In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, Danielle explains the journalistic, ethical and artistic forethought her role as a visual storyteller of others’ stories requires and describes the impact of both her images and her activism on communities she has profiled and more recently on the worldwide community of lens-based workers. https://www.daniellevillasana.com/ https://www.ayunfotografas.com/ https://www.wewomenphoto.com/wwhome https://www.photobillofrights.com/ Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

As the co-lead vocalist of the alt-pop band Fitz and the Tantrums since 2008, Noelle Scaggs was used to seeing huge crowds through her years of live performance and touring. Their songs “Out of My League” and “The Walker,” both of which Noelle co-wrote, were certified Platinum and hit the number one spot on the Alternative Airplay chart, and in 2016 their song “HandClap” became a bona fide sensation, a triple-platinum international hit that the casual listener could hear anywhere from Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to FOX’s Superbowl preshow. What Noelle wasn’t used to seeing while on tour, however, were Black women like her in any of the myriad behind-the-scenes positions that make tours possible. When the pandemic hit and tours were canceled, Noelle gathered her thoughts and then decided to speak up. She wrote an open letter to the music industry that Billboard published in September 2020. In the letter, she states, “As an artist and a Black woman of color, I can and will no longer accept being the only person like me in any room or any stage,” and then goes on to announce the creation of Diversify the Stage. Diversify the Stage is a two-prong initiative to ensure that ethnic and sexual minorities as well as people with disabilities are not only trained for technical and production positions in the touring industry but also have access to job opportunities in those fields. In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, Noelle describes what she’s discovered about her industry and herself as she’s developed Diversify the Stage and imagines a future when the organization’s mission has been accomplished. https://www.diversifythestage.org/ Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

christopher oscar peña is an accomplished playwright with a resume that includes productions, commissions and residencies at some of the country’s most forward-thinking theatrical institutions. Among his most recent productions are the world premieres of his plays “a cautionary tail” at the Flea Theater in New York and “The Strangers” at the Clarence Brown Theatre in Knoxville, TN. chris is also amassing impressive credits as a TV writer, having written for the Emmy-nominated first season of “Jane the Virgin” on the CW and HBO’s highly lauded “Insecure” as well as the Starz series “Sweetbitter.” He is currently on the writing staff for “Promised Land,” a new series that will air this season on ABC. Early in the pandemic, chris was approached by director James Darragh to join him and composer Ellen Reid, who won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for her opera “p r i s m,” on a new project: a brand-new operatic work to be created specifically for and presented in the digital space. Never an opera aficionado, chris nonetheless jumped at the novel opportunity, and with the addition of “p r i s m” librettist Roxie Perkins, the creators hired a team of writers and composers and then filmed and recorded “Desert In.” All eight episodes are available for viewing on the streaming platform, OperaBox.tv. “Desert In” was described by The Wall Street Journal as “lush and expansive … a highly original marriage of opera and series television,” and The New York Observer wrote that “this stylish film-opera hybrid … is a sun-drenched melodrama.” In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, chris describes how his enduring passion for breaking form and pushing artistic envelopes has allowed him to craft an eclectic career that amplifies his voice and core beliefs.  https://www.operabox.tv/desert-in Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Frank Horvat is a celebrated Toronto-based composer and pianist who for decades has written and performed music across genres, from contemporary classical to musical theater and electronica. In 2017 he was the inaugural recipient of the Kathleen McMorrow Music Award which recognizes outstanding work by Ontario composers. Frank is devoted to using his creative platform to support and bring awareness to causes about which he is passionate: the environment, human rights and mental health. Examples of his artivism include his album “For Those Who Died Trying” that memorializes the lives of murdered environmental activists and the “Piano Therapy” concert, a performance he developed and continues to tour in order to share his own mental health journey and to end the stigma around mental illness, particularly in the world of classical music. His upcoming projects include “Fractures,” a song cycle of 13 pieces commissioned by acclaimed soprano Meredith Hall on the subject of the environmental impact of fracking, and a brand-new commission from pianist Kara Huber, a suite of solo piano pieces about the hiking paths in and around the beautiful mountain town of Banff, Alberta. In fact, shortly after this interview was completed, Frank traveled to Banff for a month-long residency during which he hiked the area’s most spectacular trails and started composing pieces inspired by his mountain peregrinations. In this interview with Pier Carlo Talenti, Frank describes why and how he went about creating “Music for Self-Isolation,” his response to the pandemic lockdown that threatened the careers of so many of his musician colleagues. “Music for Self-Isolation” became an international phenomenon, has since been recorded as an album and is the focus of a documentary film. He also explains why being candid about his own mental illness — to himself, his loved ones and his audience — allowed his creativity to flourish in ways he couldn’t have foreseen. https://frankhorvat.com/ Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.