Flight School
B Dean (they / he) / BODYSTORM
Flight School is a launchpad for vertical dance training, performance, and infrastructure building to open the skies for more low-income, QTBIPOC artists. Flight School invests in removing barriers to vertical dance, a form that emerged from the two very white, cishet worlds of contemporary dance and recreational rock climbing. B Dean/BODYSTORM will host a regular training cohort, co-create trauma-informed safety protocols, establish a community gear library, and, in partnership with Circo Zero and Megan Lowe Dances, continue building the first collective aerial insurance umbrella.
Training will take place mostly outdoors on four distinct buildings in Oakland and San Francisco. As we engage the social and ecological history of each site, the afterlives of place emerge as their own kind of architecture, and the body becomes a site of possibility. We'll approach site-specific dance through the lens of transness, not as an identity but as a methodology, in which our superpowers/survival mechanisms of adaptation and imagination sharpen our tools for creative placemaking and worldbuilding. Flight School will build scaffolding for the next generation of queer/trans artists to take flight, in right relationship to each other and to place.
B Dean
they / he
B is an earthbound and airborne dancer, white transboy, and queer world builder from Colorado, based on unceded Ohlone land for 15 years. They perform with Flyaway Productions, Sean Dorsey Dance, Zaccho Dance Theatre, Megan Lowe Dances, Joe Goode Performance Group, Circo Zero, Clarissa Rivera Dyas, and gizeh muñiz, and have performed and taught with BANDALOOP for 12 years on skyscrapers, cliffs, and cranes across six continents. Founded in 2023, B's fiscally sponsored dance project BODYSTORM embodies complex questions from the bottom up, highlighting the intelligent technology of nature and body. Working at the intersection of contemporary dance, architecture, and direct action, B uses industrial rope access and rock climbing technology to transform buildings into unconventional stages. Centering queer, multiracial, and multidisciplinary collaboration, their performances and workshops invite expansive possibilities, opening portals for resilient communities and imaginative futures. Their work has been presented at Fresh Meat Festival (2023), BANDALOOP Studios (2024/26), Joe Goode's Gathering Room (2025), Queering Dance Festival (2026), and the San Francisco Trans March (2026). B is proud to be an Artist in Residence with Bridge Live Arts and Zaccho Studio, and to serve as President of the Board of GRAVITY.
Photo by Brooke Anderson
Headshot of B looks into the camera with a slight smile and light freckles across their face. Dark, curly hair cascades over their forehead with a fade on the sides. They are wearing a white t-shirt and a thin silver chain. A black tattoo of a shedding snake is visible on their right bicep. They are standing with their hands behind their back against a dark, textured background.
Photo by Brooke Anderson
B and Pangaea are captured mid-air in dynamic movement after letting go of each other against a cloudy sky. As they fly away from one another, they reach or look back in longing. They are both wearing neon pink and green high-vis camo costumes and harnesses.
Photo by Brooke Anderson
A crowd of visibly queer/trans people fill the intersection at Turk and Taylor St in front of the site of 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria Riot. One person is laying down in a relaxed position on the pink, blue, and white crosswalk. Some people are holding drums or brass horns, trans flags, rainbow fans, or phones pointed skywards. Some people are embracing, some are smiling, cheering, crying, or their mouths are agape. Everyone is looking up.
Photo by Brooke Anderson
A bare chested B lifting Pangaea, a mixed Black trans woman, into the air while suspended by rope/harness high above Turk and Taylor intersection in the Tenderloin. They are both wearing neon pink and green high-vis camo costumes and harnesses. In the background, beneath a grey sky sits a large multi-story building with a colorful mural at its base: the site of 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria Riot, now a GEO Group Prison.
HeartSpace Rising
Amber Julian (she/her)
"This residency will allow me to deepen relationships with the Bay Area creative community, particularly among BIPOC, Queer, and Trans artists, through an immersive experience that connects artistic expression with social transformation. By centering process over product, HeartSpace Rising will prioritize collective healing and community empowerment, welcoming artists and audience members as active contributors to an evolving, liberatory space."
HeartSpace Rising is a movement-based storytelling and performance project that expands on the foundations of HeartSpace and A Tinier Desk by bringing improvisational movement, live music, and community dialogue into a co-created healing space. Rooted in Hip Hop’s cypher tradition—a sacred space of improvisation, witnessing, and exchange—the project centers BIPOC, Queer, and Trans artists through workshops integrating movement, sound, healing, and freestyle storytelling.
Building on HeartSpace’s healing-centered artistic gatherings and A Tinier Desk’s intimate platforms for underrepresented artists, the project will culminate in a weekend festival of performances, workshops, and community dialogues. Offerings will include:
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Live performances featuring returning and new artists working in spoken word, live music, and improvisational movement.
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Community cyphers inviting attendees to participate in freestyle expression through dance, rap, and live music.
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Bodywork practitioners offering opportunities for rest, care, and embodied connection, including chair massage.
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Sensory and grounding stations designed to support nervous system regulation, with comforting objects to touch and hold, soft textures, stuffies, teas, puzzles, games, and art-making materials. These spaces will invite attendees to pause and engage at their own pace.
Amber Julian
AMBER JULIAN is an Afro-Indigenous Queer multi-disciplinary performance artist, community organizer, educator, and culture bearer. She is an arts and event producer dedicated to curating transformative cultural experiences that inspire connection, vulnerable expression, and healing. Amber designs and facilitates events that elevate marginalized voices, center QTBIPOC artists, and create spaces for collective liberation. From grassroots gatherings to large-scale productions, she ensures that every event is a catalyst for meaningful engagement and community empowerment. ACTIVATION ARTS PRODUCTIONS is a visionary creative company dedicated to fostering cultural expression, artistic innovation, and community empowerment. Co-founded by Amber Julian, the company curates transformative experiences that bridge the worlds of art, social impact, and collective healing. Specializing in event production, Activation Arts Productions brings together artists, culture bearers, and thought leaders to create immersive performances, workshops, panels, and gatherings that inspire connection and activism. AAP is committed to amplifying voices, nurturing creative expression, and fostering transformative storytelling.
Amber Julian. Photo courtesy of the artist.
she/her
Modern Natya
Swetha Prabakaran
Through my Community Engagement Residency partnership with Bridge Live Arts, my goal is to continue developing and sharing Modern Natya™, a movement methodology that bridges Bharatanatyam with contemporary dance through a disability justice lens. Rooted in tradition and shaped by lived experience, Modern Natya draws from Bharatanatyam’s pedagogical progression, including gestural language (hastas), rhythmic and postural structures (adavus), and expressive storytelling (abhinaya), while integrating accessible movement frameworks such as “Movement Translations” and other approaches developed through my training with Disabled dance practitioners (Antione Hunter of Urban Jazz Company & the artists of AXIS Dance Company).
As part of my residency, I look forward to facilitating embodied research labs, community classes, and workshops to evolve this methodology in dialogue with participants.
Swetha
Prabakaran
As Artistic Director of The Modern Natya Company™, Swetha explores themes around third-culture/diasporic identity, femininity, and intersectional accessibility.She is a 2025 Interfaith America “Voices of Bhakti” Fellow (curated by 2025-2026 CER Fellow Dr. Preethi Ramprasad!), Center for Cultural Innovation “Artistic Innovation” Awardee, & AXIS Choreo Lab Fellow.
Swetha performed her Bharatanatyam arangetram in Tirunelveli, India with Smt. Subhashini Krishnakumar (disciple of Kalaimamani Smt. K.J. Sarasa) and now continues advanced training under her mentorship and Smt. Neeraja Srinivasan (disciple of Kalaimamani Sri. J.Suryanarayana Murthy). She completed undergraduate studies at UC Berkeley’s Theater, Dance, & Performance Studies program before training in disability-justice-centered movement pedagogy through multiple summer intensives & teacher training programs at AXIS Dance Company and Dark Room Ballet.
In addition to directing The Company, Swetha champions the Modern Natya technique as a Teaching Artist at PUSH Dance Company (directed by Ms.Raissa Simpson) and is honored to perform as a company dancer with Urban Jazz Dance Company, California’s only Disabled, Deaf-led professional dance company (directed by Mx.Antoine Hunter).
Photo by Mirthica Suganathan
Swetha–a caramel-skinned Tamil woman with long black hair styled in big curls–grins while seated in front of a blurred background of white flowers and grass. She is wearing a white top and silver dangly earrings with a navy blue, gold-trimmed sash draped around her shoulders.
she / her
Photo courtesy of the artist
A group of dancers in bright pink outfits with gold trim perform in unison on an outdoor street stage, extending their arms and arching their backs. Children and other spectators sit on green mats along either side, with houses, canopy tents, and flowering trees in the background.
Photo by Ben Estabrook
Swetha, a caramel-skinned Tamil woman wearing a rich pink-and-orange sari and golden jhumkas/choker/tikka, stands in the middle of the frame with her left hand dangling gracefully in front of her heart and her right hand held delicately at her side. She gazes softly down towards her right hand. Behind her, 6 sets of similarly skin-toned arms wearing matching sari blouses/golden bangles/mehendi are stretched out in straight lines at various angles, resembling a fan.
Photo courtesy of the artist
A group of dancers in bright pink outfits with gold trim perform in unison on an outdoor street stage, turning and reaching their arms toward the sky. Children and other spectators sit on green mats along either side, with houses, canopy tents, and flowering trees in the background.