Nova Bhattacharya

Nova Bhattacharya studied bharatnatyam technique in Toronto with Menaka Thakkar. An eloquent performer, she is described by the press as “sly and dreamily contemplative” (Now Magazine), a “contained goddess” (Globe & Mail), and a “mischievous visitor from another world…” (Märksiche Allemeine). Her choreographic language investigates an overlapping zone between Indian and Euro-American dance techniques, diving into poetic, metaphoric, and mythic exaltations of the human spirit. She has created works for the Canada Dance Festival, Dancemakers, Tarragon Theatre, Toronto Dance Theatre, and others. The desire to integrate her practice into contemporary Canadian cultural expression, continues to take her along an exhilarating path of exploration and collaboration with a wide range of artists, including Peggy Baker, Dana Gingras, Ed Hanley, Mika Kurosawa, Marc Parent, and José Navas. In 2008, she founded Nova Dance, a company dedicated to creating a professional context for Indian classical dancers and to reflecting the evolution of bharatnatyam in the Canadian milieu. In 2012 she received the Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award for artistic achievement in dance, and in 2016, the Summerworks’ Outstanding Direction Award. The jury citation lauded her “radical work that pulls apart notions of power, tradition, and ritual, puncturing exoticism and querying the contemporary.

Erin Poole

Erin Poole is a Toronto‐based independent artist. She is a regular collaborator/performer with Coleman Lemieux & Compagnie, Toronto Dance Theatre, ProArte Danza, Human Body Expression (Hanna Kiel), and José Navas/Compagnie Flak. Erin was a participant of Springboard Danse workshops in Montreal (2012, 2013) and attended ImpulsTanz in Vienna, Austria (2015), with the generous support of the Canada Council for the Arts. Most recently, Erin has worked in creative process and performance in Hannover, Germany, for a multi-disciplinary, dance-theatre work, choreographed by Benjamin Landsberg and commissioned by Commedia Futura.

Lindsey Renee Derry

Lindsey Renee Derry is a dancer, choreographer and teacher based in San Francisco. She is a graduate of SUNY Purchase College, Conservatory of Dance and recipient of the 2006 Thayer Fellowship, a prestigious award given by the New York Foundation of the Arts to outstanding State University of New York (SUNY) graduates. Beyond Purchase, she spent immersive summers at Springboard Danse Montréal and the San Francisco Conservatory of Dance. After a decade of her dancing with several prominent American and Canadian dance companies including José Navas/Compagnie Flak in Montréal, Lins launched L i n s d a n s as the platform for her solo performance and teaching. In 2013, L i n s d a n s presented POR·TRAI·TURE, Lins’ first solo show garnering her an esteemed Isadora Duncan Dance Award (Izzie) for her performance in San Francisco. Since then, with the support of American Dance Abroad, festivals, and residencies she has had the opportunity to perform her solo work in North America, Europe, and Asia with her most notable performances taking place at the Beijing Dance Festival and MODAFE Korea. In San Francisco, she has received local support from the Djerassi Resident Artists Program and the Zellerbach Family Foundation. She is presently mentored by KT Nelson in San Francisco and is a dancer with Compagnie Flak and Margie Gillis’ Legacy Project in Montréal. Teaching is an integral part of L i n s d a n s’ activities both locally and abroad. From 2014-16 Lins served as an Adjunct Lecturer in Modern Dance and guest choreographer at Santa Clara University in California.

François Richard

Lauren Semeschuk