deadbird

project site: www.deadird.land / currently on tour March 31- Fall 2021 (NYC, PHL, PDX, LA) please stay tuned on how to self stream from home or purchase the film for exhibition or outside of home sharing on the deadbird.land site

As a choreographer, dancer, bodyworker, edge-walker, ceremonial guide, and registered nurse, I was just at the precipice of premiering this three-year development of a group performance about death and dying at Danspace Project in April 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic began. I was grieving the loss of the performance while simultaneously being thrust into the frontline work of being a COVID-19 nurse. deadbird is a grief space for my body as a healthcare worker, healer, and mover. On my off-days from the hospital, I re-imagined the piece as a solo dance film because I need this project in order to sustain my life and that was the safest way to continue. deadbird is also a space I invite others into to also grieve the collective trauma of these layered pandemics. It’s sister altar project can anybody help me hold this body is an invitation for 5 grieving QTPOC (queer, trans, people of color) artists to build public collective grief altars in 5 U.S. cities to hold our loneliness and recycle it into the holy, if we let it. deadbird the film and it’s public touring altar will premiere in the Spring of 2021.

deadbird live production 2020

choreography, direction and writing: devynn emory dancers: devynn emory, Stevie May, Angie Pittman, Jules Skloot sound: HPrizm voices: Julia Bennett, Neil Greenberg, Calvin Stalvig vocal editing: Michael Ryterband stage and production management: Reilly Horan

film production 2021

choreography, direction and writing: devynn emory dancers: devynn emory & mannythemannequin stage and production management: Reilly Horan film and editing Jorge Cousineau sound: HPrizm, Michael Ryterband