Skeleton Canoe

Collaborator Bios

Ty Defoe (Oneida Tribe and Anishinaabe Nation, he/we/ty )

A writer and interdisciplinary story artist. As a Grammy award winner, Ty shape-shifts, bending in and out of forms to celebrate the celestial force of rainbows on the Earth. Ty has earned fellowships and commissions from Robert Rauschenberg, MacDowell, Sundance, Kennedy Center’s Next 50, and Pop Culture Collab Trans Futurist! Ty creates work with rural communities, Broadway productions, and in the metaverse, fostering relations for Indigenous and decolonial futures. Works and authored created: Trail and Tears, River of Stone, Red Pine, The Way They Lived, Ajijaak on Turtle Island, Hear Me Say My Name, The Lesson, Firebird Tattoo, Copper Horns in Water,  Ballad of Smokey Quartz, Our Words Are Seeds, For The People, and a 2SiQ+ Pop Up Powwow. Ty has presented works at the Museum of the American Indian, The Momentary-Crystal Bridges, Guthrie Theater, Lied Center, Lincoln Center, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, LaMaMa, Carnegie Hall, the O’Neill Puppetry Conference, PAC0NYC, Under the Radar, Hayden Planetarium, and various National Parks across Turtle Island. Publications: Casting a Movement, Thorny Locust, Routledge Press, and Methuen Drama Book of Trans Plays for the Stage published by Bloomsbury. Professor of Practice at ASU and Writer-in-Residence for The Ground Beneath Our Feet at PACE in NYC. Founding member of All My Relations Collective.

www.tydefoe.com

Lux Haac(she/her) 

Lux Haac is a New York based costume designer working in theatre, film, opera, and dance. Broadway: The Thanksgiving Play (Second Stage Hayes Theater). Off-Broadway/New York: Dirty Laundry (WP Theater); Manahatta (Lucille Lortel Award winner, Drama Desk nomination), Mobile Unit: The Comedy of Errors (The Public Theater); Between Two Knees (Henry Hewes Nomination), Number Our Days: A Photographic Oratorio (PAC NYC); On That Day in Amsterdam (Primary Stages/59E59); 53% Of (Second Stage Uptown); Songs About Trains (Radical Evolution/Working Theater/New Ohio Theatre); Eureka Day (Colt Coeur/Walkerspace); Ajijaak on Turtle Island (IBEX Puppetry/New Victory Theater); R + J (Hypokrit NYC/Access Theater); ¡Figaro! (90210) (The Duke on 42nd Street). Regional: Dial M for Murder, I and You, Annapurna, Native Gardens (Syracuse Stage); For the People (Guthrie Theater); The Wizard of Oz (Geva Theatre); Between Two Knees (OSF, Yale Rep, McCarter Theatre Center, Seattle Rep); Espejos: Clean (Hartford Stage, Syracuse Stage); LEAR (Cal Shakes); Kim’s Convenience (Westport Country Playhouse, TheatreSquared); Yoga Play, Ragtime (PlayMakers Repertory Company); Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley (Arizona Theatre Company). Lux is a Core Collaborator with All My Relations Collective and a member of Wingspace Theatrical Design and USA 829. MFA: NYU/Tisch. @luxhaac

www.luxhaac.com

Katherine Freer (she/her/hers) 

Katherine Freer is a multimedia artist, filmmaker, organizer, and educator whose artistic practice lives at the intersection of story, technology, and civic engagement. Frequent collaborators include Ping Chong, Kamilah Forbes, Steve H. Broadnax III, Talvin Wilks, and Tamilla Woodard.  Recent Credits Include: We Are Your Robots (Theatre for a New Audience), Sunset Baby (Signature Theatre), Number Our Days (Perelman Performing Arts Center), La Bohème (Pacific Symphony), Family Ball (Kennedy Center), Dream Machine (Lincoln Center), Lizard Boy (Oregon Shakespeare Festival), The Little Mermaid (The Muny), and Rent (Theatre Under the Stars). She is a proud member of Wingspace Theatrical Design and United Scenic Artists Local USA 829, a core collaborator with All My Relations Collective, a collaborating artist with The TEAM, and Head of the Integrated Media Program at the University of Texas at Austin. 

www.katherinefreer.com

Amanda Sayed (Cherokee/Choctaw)

Amanda Sayed is an Indigenous interdisciplinary artist primarily focused on Artistic Producing and Stage Management. Amanda believes in using storytelling to Heal, Indigenize and Shift Narratives. She is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama where she received her MFA in Stage Management. Amanda has recently worked on projects at: PAC NYC, The Public Theatre, Signature Theatre, Primary Stages, McCarter Theatre, Seattle Rep, Long Wharf Theatre, Yale Rep, Syracuse Stage, The Old Globe, Red Bull Theater, Powerhouse Theatre, the Houston Ballet, The Momentary, Sundance, and Hogfish. Amanda has produced Drag Shows, Festivals, Fundraisers, and other large-scale events. She is based in NYC where she is a freelancer who advocates for Stage Managers as Artistic Collaborators and increasing the visibility of NativeTheater Artists across Turtle Island. Amanda is a member of AEA, core collaborator with All My Relations Collective and Producer of the Indigiqueer/ 2Spirit Pop-Up Powwow.

www.amandanitalukesayed.com

Tanya Orellana

Tanya Orellana designs live performance spaces for theatre, opera, and immersive experiences. Her work has been seen in venues across the USA including The Kennedy Center, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, The Huntington Gardens, The Kirk Douglas, CalShakes, L.A. State Historic Park, The Getty Villa, and The Greek Theatre. Her recent design collaborations include The Industry’s Sweet Land, a world premiere immersive opera directed by Yuval Sharon and Cannupa Hanska Luger, Fefu and her Friends directed by Pam MacKinnon, Oedipus directed by Jenny Koons, LA Opera’s On Gold Mountain directed by Jennifer Chang, Poor Yella Rednecks directed by Jaime Casteñeda, LEAR by Marcus Gardley directed by Eric Ting, and Rasgos Asiáticos written by Virginia Grise, a traveling scenic installation using sound, light, and objects to conjure narratives of immigration and migration in the U.S.–Mexico borderlands. Tanya received her MFA in Scenic Design from CalArts and is the 2016 recipient of the Princess Grace Fabergé Theatre Award. She is a member of Wingspace Theatrical Design, and an organizing member of La Gente: The Latiné Production Network.

www.tanyaorellana.com

Olivia Shortt (They/them//Anishinaabe, Nipissing First Nation// ireland // canada)

Olivia Shortt is a weirdo, noisemaker, sound artist, video artist, curator, saxophonist, vocalist, wannabe fashion icon, and composer. Shortt has been described as a “glittering, rising star in the exploratory music firmament” by Musicworks Magazine and named by the CBC as one of “6 Indigenous composers you need to know in 2024”. Their video artwork has been presented by organizations such as Din of Shadows (Toronto), the University of Toronto, Probably Theatre (Halifax/Toronto), and the Matriarchs Uprising Festival (Vancouver). Their sound design and compositional work have been heard at The University of Toronto (The Trials by Dawn King), Native Earth Performing Arts & Nightwood Theatre's 'Embodying Power and Place’, and the upcoming VR project of The Witness Blanket (Inspired by a woven blanket, the Witness Blanket is a large-scale work of art. It contains hundreds of items reclaimed from residential schools, churches, government buildings and traditional and cultural structures from across Canada). Shortt has performed at the Perelman Performing Art Center (NYC), The Whitney Biennial (NYC), The Holland Festival (Amsterdam) and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian (Washington, DC). Shortt was recently an Artist-in-Residence at The University of Toronto and Carleton University (Ottawa, Canada). They studied music at The University of Toronto and Dartmouth College. Iconic moments include appearing and playing saxophone on CBC Kids’ ‘Gary the Unicorn’ and lending their voice off-screen in Stephen King’s ‘In the Tall Grass’ and Season 3 of ‘Chucky’. 

www.olivia-shortt.com

Emma Deane

Emma Deane is an Indigenous lighting designer, and a citizen of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation. Recent credits include For the People (Guthrie Theater); Confederates (Signature Theatre NYC); The Chinese Lady, POTUS (Everyman Theater); Exception to the Rule (Studio Theatre); Little Women, Two Pianos Four Hands (Northlight Theatre); 9 Kinds of Silence (PlayCO); Trouble in Mind (Hartford Stage); Peter Pan and Wendy (Kansas City Rep); On the Far End, Jennifer Who is Leaving (Round House Theatre); Three Sisters, Much Ado About Nothing (Two River Theater); BAKKHAI (Baltimore Center Stage); In the Southern Breeze (Rattlestick Playwrights Theater); Queen of Basel (TheaterWorks Hartford); Jane Eyre, Dial ‘M’ for Murder, Newtown (Geva Theatre Center); Manahatta (Yale Repertory Theater); ​MFA - Yale School of Drama. Member of USA 829.  2023 Recipient 1/52 Grant.

www.emmadeane.com

Chicago Puppet Studio

The Chicago Puppet Studio is the design and manufacturing arm of The Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival organization creating original puppetry elements for theaters and theater artists nationally. Under the leadership of studio co-founders Blair Thomas and Tom Lee, a small team of highly-skilled builders and designers create, manufacture and implement puppetry designs into productions for theater, opera, tv, film, etc. Services range from the design and creation of a suite of puppets, to creation of integrated theater concepts featuring object manipulation, to building unique puppet set design for film work to assisting with the rehearsal and performance process to assure the puppets are manipulated to greatest effect. The Chicago Puppet Studio works in all puppetry styles (shadow, bunraku, marionette, plush, large scale spectacle, etc.) and materials (latex, foam, wood, metal, etc.) to bring artistic clients’ ideas into full creative fruition.

Mark Denning (enrolled tribal member of the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin) 

Mark has been involved in public education programming for over 40 years. From his time as a student at Marquette University to being an adjunct lecturer at a University in Milwaukee, Mark has spent the time speaking for and about Native issues. Out of all those years, the two things he’s become sure about is that everyone needs help, and it is an honor to help those who need it. In education, we all need help because our process is a reciprocal relationship between us and our students. Our challenge is to meet them where they are at — the more we seek the truth, the more truth-telling is needed. It takes time, conversation, and commitment to get  the best program fit possible.  When it comes to educating about Native people, one of the best strategies is finding truth in the voices of Native people. The needs of organizations are unique, and that is why Mark offers a diversity of programming. He is here to help amplify the voice of Native American components in schools, civic organizations, entertainment, and culturally specialized events that require a strategic and authentic voice. Everyone’s time is valuable, and no one program will fit every need. More programming options create more ways to fit your needs.

www.markdenning.com

The Great Lakes Lifeways Institute

Great Lakes Lifeways Institute was established as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in 2009 to engage diverse grassroots community groups across the Great Lakes region and Canada. By sharing our skills, knowledge, and resources, we are revitalizing traditional ways of being. With the support of Elders and knowledge keepers, we are rebuilding traditional land-based practices and inviting community members of all ages to immerse themselves in the reclamation of their knowledge and power. This knowledge and power is reified through seasonal harvest camps, the construction of traditional cultural spaces, and ancestral watercraft. Every event is a beautiful opportunity to spread awareness about the importance of exercising treaty rights and for the transference of intergenerational knowledge. 

With nearly 15 years of experience in doing this good work, we have woven a wide web of partnerships, strengthening relationships between-and-across tribal communities. We have an intention to be agile and adaptable to meet the rapidly changing needs of key stakeholders at the forefront of movements. We value being small, sustainable, and efficient with our generously-gifted resources. Our goal is to disrupt harmful and unjust colonial structures by innovating and modeling collaborative solutions which can then be seeded out across Turtle Island. We invest in groups and individuals who are reimagining and rebuilding a vibrant and equitable world. Our organization model is based upon inclusion, collective navigation, safety, healing, and consensus. We believe that the way we organize ourselves in our work and how we apply our values system is as important as the physical outcomes of our projects.

greatlakeslifeways.org

Jiahao (Neil) Qiu 邱嘉皓 he/him

Jiahao (Neil) Qiu 邱嘉皓 is a Chinese-born theatre collaborator and lighting designer. His recent design credits in the US includes: Be A Good Little Widow (Open Variations Theater), The Wilderness (Time Theatre Collective), Redemption Story (The Associates Theater Ensemble), Two Takes: The Peony Pavilion - Bloom (LMCC), Seven Cousins For a Horse (Thrown Stone Theatre), Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Yale Repertory Theatre, Connecticut Critics Circle Award). For more information, please visit nealqiu.com | @neilqiu_design

Katrina Brown Akootchook (Oneida Nation of the Thames, Bear Clan)

Kat is an artist and educator, who works with beads, printmaking, and design. She blends contemporary & traditional elements with a sense of humor and a heart for activism. She often uses her art to call attention to Indigenous rights movements and youth education.