COMMUNITY PARTNERS
In a side-by-side step, Invertigo co-creates through enduring partnerships.
COMMUNITY STORIES
Independent Shakespeare Company
Every year since 2008, Invertigo has partnered with ISC to bring dance to their annual free festival. ISC is a generous, thoughtful partner, and their audiences reflect the broader LA population in a genuinely wonderful way. Each year, we create dance performances based on one of ISC’s summer shows, and perform it for expansive, enthusiastic crowds. From Feste’s Dream to Waiting at Home for the Witches, this partnership has yielded artistic inspiration and community connections, and it is a joy and honor. Connect with ISC here.
World Refugee Day
As part of our community engagement for After It Happened, Invertigo partnered with the Refugee Forum of Los Angeles to bring a performance and community choreography workshop to the World Refugee Day event. Sofia, Sadie and Jessica performed a trio about women’s strength in the face of trauma, joy in the face of despair, community in the face of isolation. Laura worked with participants to create a dance for and with the whole community, using the themes of “hope” and “joy,” and the whole room moved together. One woman spoke to us afterwards through tears. She felt so personally connected to the subject matter, and she told us about her own experiences. It was such an honour to be able simply to stand and listen to her. Then she said, “I love the theatre. It is 6 years and I have not seen anything on a stage. Today I am very happy I see something on a stage again.” Dance is a great connector. Connect with World Refugee Day here.
Craft Contemporary
After It Happened was about a community rebuilding after a natural disaster, and our partnership with Craft Contemporary was a vibrant series of 3 workshops. We held a community set-build, so people could be involved in creating our onstage world with us and weave their own stories into the set. The show featured materials that were repurposed and transformed, so we held a puppet-making workshop. Then we held an intergenerational Storytelling Through Movement workshop, and participants created a unique one-time dance installation within the Gronk exhibit. The partnership brought our respective audiences together, and proved to be a rich collaboration. Connect with Craft Contemporary here.
Meet the youth organizations, arts centers, civic agencies, schools, dance studios, alternative education hubs, and presenting arts institutions that Invertigo partners with for weekly classes, monthly events and annual programming. Whether one-off or ongoing, local or national, Invertigo builds community ties and arts partnerships with intention, authenticity and collaborative spirit.
YMCA
CC High/AVPA
The Wallis
Electric Lodge
Hope Street
Kayne Eras
Broad Stage
City of Beverly Hills
LA Star Dance
Magic Circle
Nefa
LACDAC
LACAC
California Arts Council
Parkinson’s Foundation
LA County Supervisor Mark Ridley Thomas
LA County Supervisor Kathryn Barger
LA City Council Member Greig Smith
City of West Hollywood Trans Arts Initiative
Beverly Hills Rotary Foundation
Department of Cultural Affairs
Tom’s Shoes
“We can see the effect of these classes physically, emotionally and creatively for our kids.”
– Gina Avila, Hope Street Family Center
Hope Street Family Center & Invertigo: Ongoing Partnership
Hope Street Family Center is one of Invertigo’s most long-standing community partners. This past June and July, Invertigo was invited to join the Family Play Time meetings via zoom as guest artist. Teaching Artist, Rosa Navarrete shared movement exercises with the families, using fun practices like the Name Game, Patterns of Total Body Connectivity, and Storytelling. The group built movement pieces together inspired by their exchanges. We had children of all ages, the youngest being four months old! Dance was centered, and Body and Mind were interlaced in this beautiful engagement featuring fun books like Llama Llama Rojo Pijama by Anna Dewdney and From Head to Toe by Eric Carle. Thank you Hope Street Family Center for trusting us with your sacred spaces, even the virtual ones. We had a wonderful time, dancing from page to page.