with LaTasha Barnes & Michele Byrd-McPhee
Donation $0 - 25
Artist-Activists Michele Byrd-McPhee & LaTasha Barnes embody the feminine power that changes lives, moves mountains and causes waves in the world of Hip Hop dance. Join them for an intimate discussion all about their use of dance as protest, dance as freedom and dance as joy as they unpack the history, legacy and cultural impact of the highly innovative and forever fly women in Hip Hop dance.
Michele Byrd-McPhee is the founder and Executive Director of Ladies of Hip-Hop. Michele has been working for many years to re-contextualize spaces and conversation of Hip-Hop culture along gender, sex, cultural and socio-historical and racial lines for decades along with situating the arts and dance techniques in spaces that honor and acknowledge their roots and the many creative pioneers who have shaped them. This is especially important given the ways in which Black dance (and Hip-Hop especially) has been co-opted into studio appropriation given its community cultural origins.
Michele just wrapped 16-years self-producing Ladies of Hip-Hop's annual festival. It is now in (3) cities across the globe and growing. LOHH Los Angeles, LOHH Toronto and the week-long festival in New York City. LOHH LA and LOHH TO are both done in partnership with other female organizers.
Michele earned her BS from Temple University & an MS in Nonprofit Arts Management from Drexel University. Michele also worked many years in TV and arts production, working as a production coordinator at Brooklyn Academy of Music and then as a Senior Music Coordinator at Late Night with Seth Meyers. Michele currently serves as a Bessie Award Committee Member along with her ongoing commitment as Executive Director for Ladies of Hip-Hop.
Michele has been awarded an Integrated Arts Residency Fellowship grant through University of Wisconsin-Madison Division of the arts and is currently teaching her course, Hip-Hop, Women and the World.
LaTasha “Tasha” Barnes is an internationally recognized and awarded dancer, choreographer, educator, performer, cultural ambassador and Tradition-bearer of Black American Social Dance from Richmond, VA. Currently based in New York, Barnes is globally celebrated for her musicality, athleticism, and joyful presence throughout the cultural traditions she bears: House, Hip-Hop, Waacking, Vernacular Jazz, and Lindy Hop. Her expansive artistic, competitive and performative skills have made her a frequent collaborator to Dorrance Dance, Singapore based Timbre Arts Group, Ephrat Asherie Dance and many more. Her leadership and business skills have placed her in positions of service as Chair of the Board of Trustees for Ladies of Hip-Hop FestivalⓇ, Vice President of Marketing & Outreach for the International Lindy Hop ChampionshipⓇ, Board Member of the Black Lindy Hoppers Fund, the Frankie Manning Foundation and a contributing member to the NEFER Global Movement Collective.
Expanding the scope of impact for the communities she serves, Barnes completed her self-designed Master's in Ethnochoreology, Black Studies and Performance Studies thru New York University Gallatin School (2019). Her thesis and continuing research are working to bridge the gap between communities of practice and academic cultural dance research, performance, preservation and pedagogy. In concert with these efforts she is honored to be a part of the Brain Trust developing the ground-breaking stage production Swing Out, bringing the passion and power of Lindy Hop and it’s community to the concert stage. She is also honored to be a developing partner of several intergenerational and intercommunal cultural arts exchanges and performances that will be presented in the near future. Additionally in support of this dialogue, Barnes is a contributing author to the forthcoming text 21st Century Jazz Dance: Africanist Aesthetics and Equity in Teaching and Choreography - Univ. FL Press (2021).
Through all her efforts Barnes' forever purpose is to inspire fellow artists and arts enthusiasts to champion artivism through cultivating an authentic sense of self and intention in their creative expressions and daily lives.