La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club Presents Pioneers Go East Collective’s Crossroads Series
Company:
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club will present Pioneers Go East Collective’s Crossroads Series as part of the 21st annual La MaMa Moves! Dance Festival. Performances are May 8 at 7:30pm, May 9 at 5pm, and May 10 at 3pm at The Club, 74A East 4th Street. Tickets are $30 (general), $25 (students/seniors), with a $50 Support the Artists ticket option. Tickets are available at https://ci.ovationtix.com/42/production/1267178 and https://ci.ovationtix.com/42/production/1267179?performanceId=11772714. Festival packages start at $45 and are available at https://ci.ovationtix.com/42/store/packages. Additionally, the first 10 tickets of each performance are $10 (limit 2 per person).
Crossroads Series is a series championing radical Queer voices. Four new short works from Pioneers Go East Collective’s series empowering multigenerational LGBTQ+ and feminist artists in dialogue with their communities. Featuring works from our collective and friends, including Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte with Anabella Lenzu; Miranda Brown and Noa Rui-Piin Weiss; Sugar Vendil; and Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte with ALEXA Grae and Symara Sarai.
Performances
Distance/ decay /
by Pioneers Go East Collective
With Anabella Lenzu (choreographer/performance artist); vocal score by syd island; direction / filmmaker Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte; design Philip Treviño
Length of work: 25 minutes
Distance /decay / is a performance and video installation by Pioneers Go East Collective. Blending dance, music in a media installation created by Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte (director/ filmmaker/installation), Anabella Lenzu(choreographer/ performance artist), syd island (composer/performance artist), Philip Treviño (production design), Adele Overbey and Todd Carroll (cinematographers). The work is inspired by Latina Feminist poet Alejandra Pizarnik's writings and archival records, which explore themes of displacement, artistic agency, and belonging.
¿¡¡simon negs ≈≈>:(:[[**
Created and Performed by Miranda Brown & Noa Rui-Piin Weiss
Length of work: 30 minutes
Part two of a diptych, ¿¡¡simon negs ≈≈>:(:[[** is the Mr. Hyde, the Black Swan, the bad cop, the “you’re not you when you’re hungry” alter ego of Miranda and Noa’s recent work, !!simon says~~!:));)$$ (2024). While warming up for their last performance, Noa and Miranda realized that their silly dances may go down in history as “art under the rise of fascism in America.” So then they thought, let’s write some grants about that. Approximately one year later, witness the work-in-progress that is, ¿¡¡simon negs ≈≈>:(:[[** . It’s just two dancers trying their best to follow a series of increasingly difficult and ruthless instructions.
Performances on Sunday May 10th @ 3pm
split bill:
Antonym: the opposite of nostalgia (excerpt)
Choreography and music composition by Sugar Vendil.
Mei Ann Teo, Artistic Consultant. Harriet Jung, Costume Designer
Length of work: 20 minutes
Antonym: the opposite of nostalgia is a memoir of a Filipinx American childhood that interweaves chamber music, dance, and nonlinear theater in an interdisciplinary performance. Excavating seemingly insignificant but deeply ingrained memories, Antonym envisions the future as an escape from pain and ponders how we can possess painful memories without being beholden to them. Using field recordings of New York City to create a rich sonic landscape, the four seasons serve as a cyclical frame and context for memory.
“Antonym” is made possible by: MAP Fund; New Music USA Project Grant; National Performance Network Creation and Development Grant with co-commissioners Living Arts Tulsa; High Concept Labs; and National Sawdust; 2024 and 2025 NEFA NTP Artist Development Grants; the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature in partnership with JACK. This work was first developed as part of Mabou Mines’ Resident Artist Program and High Concept Labs in 2019.
A Sea In-MOTION (excerpt)
by Pioneers Go East Collective
w/ ALEXA Grae (composer, performance artist); Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte (direction, filmmaker, writer); and Symara Sarai (choreographer, performance artist); designed by Philip Treviño; and cinematographers and animation by bree breeden and Kathleen Kelley.
Length of work: 25 minutes
A Sea In-MOTION symbolizes social change, reflecting the unrest and unpredictability we all experience in today’s world. It advocates for our collective hopes for a brighter future for the environment, emphasizing the need for transformation during these turbulent times. Part of a diptych that integrates performance art and video, this installation reflects on the socio-economic landscape while advocating for a sustainable future. It symbolizes the fluidity of community identity, celebrating diversity and ecological justice, much like the ever-changing sea.
Developed by the Radical Queer artists’ collective, Pioneers Go East Collective, the project is deeply influenced by Françoise d'Eaubonne's Eco-Feminist insights and Guattari's LGBTQ+ theories. The project was originally developed with residencies at Kaatsbaan Cultural Park (2024), and as part of the Socrates Sculpture Park Fellowship (2025-26) as a site-specific installation conceived by Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte (visual installation/ archival research/ filmmaker), Mark Tambella (visual installation/fabrication), and Philip Treviño (visual installation).
Party Honoring Janet Wong (New York Live Arts) and Annina Nosei
3:45pm-5pm
Artist Bios
Originally from Argentina, Anabella Lenzu is a choreographer, scholar, and educator with more than thirty-five years of professional experience in Argentina, Chile, Italy, and the United States. She is the founder and artistic director of Anabella Lenzu/DanceDrama, a New York City–based company established in 2006 and dedicated to creating thought-provoking, historically conscious dance-theater. Under her direction, the company has presented approximately 400 performances, created 15 original works, contributing a distinct voice to the dance-theater landscape. As a choreographer, Lenzu has been commissioned internationally for opera, theater, television, and numerous dance companies. Her work for the camera extends her choreographic language into cinematic form, emphasizing intimacy, gesture, and narrative. Lenzu is a respected writer and scholar, contributing to dance and arts publications and authoring two books: Unveiling Motion and Emotion (2013), written in Spanish and English, and Teaching Dance through Meaningful Gestures (2025), which explores technique as philosophy and the body as an instrument of expression. In October 2024, she was appointed President of the American Dance Guild, continuing her long-standing commitment to leadership, education, and community building in the field of dance.
Miranda Brown & Noa Rui-Piin Weiss are trying their best to make a good dance. They have been trying together for over five years. Their attempts have appeared at The Brick, Pageant, Judson Memorial Church, JACK, and the corner of a warehouse in Industry City for the Brooklyn Rail’s Gala, among others. These two artists are still performing thanks to the support of a few pivotal figures including Theresa Bucheister, Gian Marco Ricardo Lo Forte, and the Exponential Festival team (Bailey Williams, Nic Adams, Nurit Chinn). The artists would also like to thank their dance godmother Adrienne Truscott for being a Genius.
Shana Crawford is a dance artist, lighting designer, production manager and educator based in New York. Recent lighting collaborations are with Jessie Young, Juliana May, Jaamil Olawale Kosoko, Laurie Berg, Madeline Best, Stephanie Acosta, and Yanan Yu, among others. She is one of the co-organizers with AUNTS, ran two years of the River to River Festival with LMCC, and continues to produce events alongside her role as TD at the Chocolate Factory Theater.
Sugar Vendil is a choreographer, composer, pianist and interdisciplinary artist based in Lenapehoking, known as Brooklyn, NY. She started her artistic life as a classical pianist, and after spending nearly a decade searching for her own voice, her practice evolved into making music and performances that integrate sound, movement, and unconventional approaches to the piano. She has a keyboard/synth duo, Vanity Project, with composer Trevor Gureckis. Vendil’s work germinates from a kinesthetic and improvisatory approach. Her work challenges preexisting notions of virtuosity. Vendil’s work contains a potent sense of physicality and is obliquely autobiographical. Detaching from linearity and narrative, she conjures the immediate and raw emotions that are still perceivable from imperfect memories.
sugar vendil/isogram makes interdisciplinary performances that interweave sound, movement, and non-narrative theater, forming connective threads that encourage closer inspection. Isogram blurs boundaries between genres and embraces nonlinearity. Founder and interdisciplinary artist Sugar Vendil (she/they) is a child of immigrants who is forging new creative pathways as a second generation Filipinx American.
Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte (director, filmmaker, installation, archival research) is a Gay immigrant, and a NYC-based time-based installation artist and filmmaker. An artist-in-residence at Judson Church, La MaMa, Socrates Sculpture Park, and The LGBT Center, in addition to his creative work, Gian Marco Riccardo is the artistic director of Pioneers Go East Collective, a multicultural radical Queer performance and visual art collective based in the Lower East Side. He is the recipient of NYSCA (2023-2026 Creative Residency Award); Foundation for Contemporary Arts (2019-22); NYSCA Individual Artist recipient (2019); LMCC/Creative Engagement recipient (2014-18). Finalist for Creative Capital Award (2025); and finalist for the Jerome Foundation's Fellowship (2019-20). He was awarded residencies at Socrates Sculpture Park Fellowship (2025-26); EMAR – The Elizabeth Murray Artists Residency (Washington County, NY, 2024 & 2026); Collar Works Gallery (Troy, NY, 2023); Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) artist-in-residence (2023); BRIClab - BRIC ARTS MEDIA (2021-22); Center for Performance Research’s AIR (2022); LMCC at Governors Island - Process Space Residency (2014/15). Additional creative residencies/presentations at Kaatsbaan Cultural Park (2024); Lumberyard (2023); JACK (2018), Chashama Gallery (2012), Goethe Institute Gallery (2012).
Philip Treviño (lighting designer) is a 2010 recipient of a BESSIE New York Dance and Performance Award BESSIE for his lighting and scenic design for Pam Tanowitz’s Be In The Gray With Me. He is also the scenic designer for Camille A. Brown and Company’s Mr. Tol E. Rance, which won a 2014 BESSIE for Outstanding Production. Philip is designer-in-residence and curator with Pioneers Go East Collective since 2016 and was in residency at BRICLab, BAM, Kaatsbaan, Collar Works, and Elizabeth Murray Artist Residency. Some of his other credits in lighting, scenic and installation design can be seen in works by Brian Brooks Moving Company, Camille A. Brown and Dancers, Henning Rübsam’s Sensedance, Kymera Dance, Pam Tanowitz Dance and Chris Tanner/Brandon Olson’s Ravaged by Romance at LaMaMa. His work has toured nationally, internationally and at such notable venues as BAM, The Joyce, Joyce Soho, Dance Theatre Workshop, Lincoln Center Out of Doors, The Kitchen, New York City Center and Jacob’s Pillow.
Pioneers Go East Collective is a radical queer laboratory collective of performing and visual artists, curators and social practitioners dedicated to time-based and media art to empower the LGBTQ+ experience. Since 2012 based in New York City, we create works of high artistic merit, speak out about social issues and build a platform to positively impact the LGBTQ+ community. Founded and led by Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte, Daniel Diaz, and Philip Treviño, in collaboration with Joey Kipp, ALEXA GRÆ, Anabella Lenzu, Mark Tambella, and syd island, the collective portrays same-gender-loving experiences, memory, and marginalization that resonate with contemporary lives. Pioneers Go East Collective combines stories of vulnerability and courage with popular culture to facilitate communal meaning and advocate for cultural integrity.
Pioneers Go East Collective’s work has been developed in residencies and presented in New York City at Socrates Sculpture Park (2025/26), BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music’s residency in 2023), BRIC ARTS MEDIA (2022/23), The LGBT Center (2019-24), Judson Church (2018-26), La MaMa Moves (2024), Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance (2018-19), Center for Performance Research (2021-23), JACK (2018), La MaMa (2012-26), St Ann's Warehouse (2014), Governors Island/ Process Residency LMCC (2013/14), Chashama Gallery (2012), Goethe Institute Gallery (2012); and Upstate NY at Lumberyard (Catskill, NY) in 2023, Collar Works Gallery (Troy, NY) in 2023, Elizabeth Murray Artist Residency (2024), Kaatsbaan Cultural Park (Tivoli, NY) in 2024, and Time Space Limited (Hudson, NY) in 2025. Current collaborators: Symara Sarai, Darrin Wright, Joyce Isabelle, Azmi Mert Erdem, joy burklund, Adele Overbey, bree breeden, Kathleen Kelley, and Bryan Baira.
Symara Sarai, a Portland, Oregon native currently residing in Brooklyn, has immersed herself in interdisciplinary and choreographic studies globally with deep recognition. Named Dance Magazine’s 2025 “Top 25 to Watch,” a 2023 Bessie Winner for Breakout Choreographer, and a recipient of the Dai Ailian Foundation Scholarship based in Trinidad and Tobago, she is known to be a courageously committed performer and maker. The Dai Ailian Foundation scholarship led her to Beijing, China where she spent two years gaining an associate degree in modern choreography at the Beijing Dance Academy. Sarai is a 2019 graduate of SUNY Purchase’s Conservatory of Dance Program. She was a resident artist for Bearnstow, Gibney 6.2 Work Up, Gallim’s 2022 Moving Artist’s Residency, BAX’s Fall 2022 Space Grant Program, Center for Performance Research’s 2022 AIR Program, New York Live Arts Fresh Tracks Artist 23/24 as well as a 23/24 Women in Motion Commissioned artist. They are currently a 24-26 Movement Research Artist in Residence and a 24-26 Abrons Arts Center Performance AIRspace Resident. Their work as a performer and maker has been reviewed and featured in the NY Times, Dance Enthusiast, Fjord Review, as well as promoted through Forbes. She has had multiple film works commissioned by Berlin-based choreographer Christoph Winkler. They have presented work at New York Live Arts, The Clarice at UMD, The LGBT Center in NY, Judson Church, BAAD, Kestrels, and other venues throughout the United States, China, and Germany. She is currently an Urban Bush Women company member. She has also notably worked with Jasmine Hearn, Ogemdi Ude, Pioneers Go East Collective, Kevin Wynn, Joanna Kotze, Nattie Trogdon+Hollis Bartlett, and Slowdanger, among others.
Alexa Grae (they/them) is an interdisciplinary artist, vocalist, and composer. They have collaborated with Stephanie Acosta, Isaac Pool, Jessie Young, Same As Sister, and Pioneers Go East Collective at La Mama. ALEXA released their studio song cycle ‘SEEN’ with the premiere of ‘Sur La Nuit’ an operatic - electronic music video (Matthew Ozawa & Jon Wes) at The Art Institute Chicago with Open Television. They have performed with Haymarket Opera Company, Madison Opera, Elements Contemporary Ballet, as well as a featured soloist/artist with Chicago Arts Orchestra, The Savannah Philharmonic, Northwestern University Orchestra, The Orchestra of New Spain, and Texas Tech University Symphony Orchestra. They have created scores for short films: Searching for Isabelle (Stephanie Jeter) & Let Go and Let God (Rashida KhanBey), and served as a musical contributor for Bring The Beat Back (Derek McPhatter).
La MaMa Moves! 2026, the 21st season of La MaMa’s annual dance festival, brings together dance artists at all stages of their careers to experiment, collaborate, and share new work. Curated by Nicky Paraiso, the festival will take place over five weeks in April and May of 2026 and will include twelve productions across La MaMa’s four venues, and up to four in-person community workshops and public discussions. This year’s festival line-up features dancemakers Donald Byrd, Beth Corning with guest puppeteer Tom Lee, Vangeline, Patricia Hoffbauer, Dancers Unlimited, Sun Kim Dance Theatre, Green Cow, Iver Findlay, BamBam Frost & Ori Flomin, Pioneers Go East Collective, and ms. z tye & Mina Nishimura in a shared weekend curated by La MaMa Curatorial Residents Martita Abril & Blaze Ferrer.
Building on the festival’s growing national impact, La MaMa Moves! will again offer hybrid programming that extends beyond New York City, including livestreams of several productions and open rehearsals or interactive discussions designed for online audiences, partners, and students across the U.S. These online/hybrid events are part of La MaMa’s ongoing work with Bloomberg Philanthropies Digital Accelerator program. These types of programs are essential not only to La MaMa’s mission and strategic plan, but to the sustainability of the dance community, because they empower and connect generations of dance artists.
In 2026, La MaMa Moves! continues its Curatorial Residency for the second year. Over six months, Curatorial Residents Martita Abril and Blaze Ferrer work with Nicky Paraiso as they plan and execute a shared program to be presented in the festival. Curatorial Residents have research time in the La MaMa Archive (which documents 60+ years of dance history) and attend productions across NYC with Paraiso. The residency aims to provide curatorial mentorship and professional development to young dance artists, empowering them to build sustainable careers while bringing new voices into La MaMa.
La MaMa Moves! highlights the extraordinary diversity and range of artists across cultural backgrounds, ages, and dance styles. By amplifying underrepresented voices and fostering intergenerational exchange, the festival continues to reimagine what contemporary dance can be. One of New York’s signature dance festivals, La MaMa Moves! has showcased small and large-scale works of more than 400 emerging and seasoned choreographers since its beginning in 2005. With sustained support, La MaMa can deepen this impact and ensure that visionary artists and their communities have continued access to this vital platform for years to come.
About La MaMa
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club is dedicated to the artist and all aspects of the theatre. La MaMa's 64th Season, LA MAMA NOW, focuses on creating solidarity and building community, exploring ways to build connections for cross-sector coalition and invite artists, activists, organizers and community members into the creative process.
La MaMa has been honored with 30+ Obie Awards, dozens of Drama Desk, Bessie Awards, Villager Awards, the 2018 Regional Theatre Tony Award, and most recently a 2023 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Special Citation. We are a creative home to artists and resident companies from around the world, many of whom have made lasting contributions to the arts, including Blue Man Group, Bette Midler, Ping Chong, Jackie Curtis, Robert De Niro, André De Shields, Adrienne Kennedy, Cole Escola, Bridget Everett, Harvey Fierstein, Diane Lane, Charles Ludlam, Tom Eyen, Spiderwoman Theater, Tadeusz Kantor, Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, Meredith Monk, David and Amy Sedaris, Stephanie Hsu, Julie Taymor, Kazuo Ohno, Tom O'Horgan, Andrei Serban, Liz Swados, and Andy Warhol. La MaMa's vision of nurturing new artists and new work from all nations, cultures, races and identities remains as strong today as it was when Ellen Stewart first opened the doors in 1961.
