ADMISSION:
Admission is free. Reservations required. RSVP beginning Monday, December 9, at 9 a.m.

RSVP

DESCRIPTION:
Following up on Josette Bushell-Mingo’s performance of Nina—A Story about Me and Nina Simone, USC students and the larger community are invited to participate in a conversation with Bushell-Mingo and USC professors Anita Dashiell-Sparks (Dramatic Arts), d. Sabela grimes (Dance), and Edwin Hill (French and Italian and American Studies and Ethnicity) exploring the legacy of art, politics, and rage. The conversation will be moderated by educator and artist Unique Holland.

Bios:

Josette Bushell-Mingo OBE is a Swedish-based English theatre actress and director. She was nominated for an Olivier Award in 2000 for Best Actress in a Musical for her role as Rafiki in the London production of The Lion King. In 2001, she founded a black-led arts festival called PUSH at the Young Vic and between 2005-2018 she was the Artistic Director for The Swedish National Touring Theatre’s Tyst Teater——theatre in Swedish sign language. She is currently prefect for the institution for acting at Stockholm’s performing arts university and artistic director for The National Black Theatre of Sweden.

Anita Dashiell-Sparks is an associate professor of theatre practice at the USC School of Dramatic Arts. She is a graduate of the prestigious New York University, Tisch School of the Arts’ graduate acting program. As an actor based in New York and Los Angeles, she has graced the stage on Broadway, appeared in numerous off-Broadway and regional theatre productions, and appeared on television. Dashiell-Sparks is the founder and director of Building Bridges: Communication, Expression, Empowerment Theatre Arts Program, which teaches self-presentation and self-expression to at-risk youth.

d. Sabela grimes is a choreographer, writer, composer. and educator whose interdisciplinary performance work and pedagogical approach reveal a vested interest in the physical and meta-physical efficacies of Afro-Diasporic cultural practices. The assistant professor of practice at the USC Kaufman School of Dance has been described by the Los Angeles Times as “the Los Angeles dance world’s best-kept secret” and as “one of a mere handful of artists who make up the vanguard of hip-hop fusion."

Edwin Hill seeks to highlight the marginalized intellectual and cultural traffic between France and the Americas. He has published and/or presented on contemporary Caribbean writers, Sub-Saharan francophone literature, African American popular music, French chanson, and francophone hip hop. The associate professor of French and Italian and American Studies and Ethnicity's teaching interests, while focusing on black vernacular culture and France, extend from the poetry of Negritude writers to postcolonial explorations of contemporary francophone writers and musicians.

Related Events:
Nina—A Story about Me and Nina Simone
Performed by Josette Bushell-Mingo
Wednesday, January 15, 2020, at 7:30 p.m.
Bing Theatre
For more info, click here.

Performance, Politics, and Power
A Workshop with Josette Bushell-Mingo
Friday, January 17, 2020, at 10 a.m.
Physical Education Building 207
For more info, click here.

Presented by USC Visions and Voices: The Arts and Humanities Initiative. Organized by Brent Blair (Dramatic Arts), Anita Dashiell-Sparks (Dramatic Arts), and Suzanne Lacy (Art and Design) in collaboration with the National Touring Theatre of Sweden, the Embassy of Sweden, and the Barbro Osher Pro Suecia Foundation. 

Photo: Andrew Ness