36th Annual BMCA Conference 
Being With. . .
Presenter Biographies

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Hybrid | Onsite | Remote & Video Performers

Hybrid | Onsite | Remote & Video Performers

all bios are alphabetical by first name

Hybrid Presenters

B.J. Sullivan, known for creating “Safety Release Technique”is an international dance artist and scholar who began dancing in upstate NY. B.J. received her BFA from The Juilliard School and MFA from the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign. A professor in the School of Dance at the University of North Carolina Greensboro, she teaches courses in movement technique and pedagogy, performance, choreography, contact improvisation and partnering techniques, and the body in motion and wellness theories. Her research and choreography combines contemporary movement possibilities and somatic practices with dance training methods such as ballet, Graham, Horton, Limón, and Taylor and other body-based techniques she has studied throughout her career.

Billy James Hawkains III (MFA, BFA), dance artist and educator, is the founder of The III (Third) Collective, a band of artists in collaboration and conversation with each other to generate relevant, provoking works of art. He has performed nationally and internationally in works by recognized choreographers including Duane Cyrus, B.J.Sullivan, Juel D. Lane, Doug Varone, Merce Cunningham, Paul Taylor, and more. In 2020 Hawkains joined the faculty of Kennesaw State University where he teaches Choreography, Improvisation, Ballet, Dance Entrepreneurship, and Safety Release technique (SRT). His scholarship focuses on SRT and how its practical application aids dancers of African descent in the process of relieving themselves from pressures to conform to unjust standards. 

Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen (OTR/L. RSMT, RSME) is a movement artist, researcher, educator and therapist. She has been working with movement, touch and the body-mind relationship for over 50 years. As innovator and leader in developing the Body-Mind Centering® approach, her work has influenced the fields of bodywork, movement, dance, yoga, body psychotherapy, childhood education and many other body[1]mind disciplines. In 1973, she founded The School for Body-Mind Centering which offers certification programs in seventeen countries. Bonnie’s current publications include: Sensing, Feeling, and Action, The Mechanics of Vocal Expression and Basic Neuocellular Patterns: Exploring Developmental Movement.

Caitlyn Schrader, is a dance artist and educator. She holds a dual-role at University of North Carolina Greensboro (UNCG) – Director of the School of Art’s off-campus gallery and Community Engagement; she also adjuncts in the Schools of Dance and Art. She makes and presents individual and collaborative works under the monikers DanSeries Collective and The Liminality Project. She received an MFA in Dance from UNCG, a MS from the Univ. of Rochester, and a BA from Hobart and William Smith Colleges. As a mover and maker, she is steeped in the practice of Safety Release Technique and rooted from somatic perspectives through her personal investigations in yoga, Kinetic Awareness, Cortical Field Reeducation, and Alexander Technique. She strives to use dance as a strategy to construct and invite diverse experiences, exploring how dance intersects with life, challenging easy classifications through social provocation and immersive community platforms. 

Damaris Webb is a theatre maker and social justice advocate. She has created new works for the stage with diverse communities around the US and internationally; her work lives in the intersection of contemplative dance, improvisational performance art, and contemporary theatre. Ms Webb is the co-founder and co-director of The Vanport Mosaic: a multidisciplinary non-profit, dedicated to presenting, celebrating and preserving the silenced histories around us in order to better understand our present and create a future where we all belong. Ms Webb holds her MFA in Contemporary Performance from Naropa University. She is an artist primarily trained in somatic studies; Body-Mind Centering®, Viewpoints Practice, Psychophysical Acting, Contemplative Dance Practice, & Roy Hart Vocal Technique.

David Hurwith made a life, dancing and performing for three decades. His performance work has been seen at venues large and small around the world. In the midst of that exploration, the study of the body’s natural expression and health supplanted an art career. For the last 25 years, he has been offering Authentic Movement and Experiential Anatomy. David is thankful for his teachers, Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen as a healer, Steve Paxton as an artist, and to Janet Adler for being instrumental in creating the form of Authentic Movement. The examples of Alison Zuber, Gail Turner, Vera Orlock, Erik Beeler, Lisa Nelson inspire me.

Erika Berland, a movement artist, BMC® Practitioner, RMT and LMT, has taught in studios and schools throughout the US and Europe. In 2004 she helped create the MFA Theater: Contemporary Performance Program at Naropa University where she developed a 2 year training for performers integrating meditation and somatic movement. Erika is a senior teacher and Meditation Instructor in the Shambhala Buddhist lineage and a founding faculty member and teacher of WELCOME: Mindful Compassion Training, a Naropa University extended study program. She is the author of Sitting:ThePhysical Art of Meditation and chapters in Movement for Actors; 2nd ed. (Allworth Publications) and Physical Dramaturgy (Routledge) and the upcoming On the Horizontal with Mary Overlie and the Viewpoints (Michigan Press).

Ethan “E.E.” Balcos, MFA, RSDE and Professor of Dance at UNC Charlotte, trained with modern dance pioneer Hanya Holm and began practicing contact improvisation in 1982. He has performed and choreographed for over 35 years, danced for numerous well-known choreographers; and presented his choreography nationally and internationally. His passion lies in the BMC® approaches applied in teaching dance, anatomy, contact improvisation, the creative process, and performance. He has presented and performed at many national Body-Mind Centering® Conferences; the Annual Somatic Dance Conference & Performance Festival; Dance and Somatic Practices Conference, Coventry, UK; Body IQ Festival, Berlin, Germany; and international conferences with ISMETA with which he is on the Board of Directors.

Jill Becker is a modern dancer, teacher and choreographer. She currently teaches dance to people with PD and T'ai Chi for Balance in Yellow Springs, Ohio. She taught dance at Antioch College, toured in Holland and Germany with Portraits of Women and directed Jill Becker & Dancers in NYC.

Jorge Samuel Faria, Samuel is a Brazilian Artist and Translator, with a background in Somatic Education and Social Justice. In 2022 he debuted his first dance-film at the United Nations high level meeting in New York City. The film was commissioned by the UN, WHO and the Claiming Our Space Program. Samuel has translated for Wendy Hambidge in Brazil, for Kunta Leonardo da Cruz who taught an Orisá Dance Class at the BMC® gathering at Pomona College, in the USA and for Joye Hardimann PhD in Brazil when she lectured on Ancestral Healing in the University of Bahia He has collaborated creatively with Wendy Hambidge since 2018, performing Seeing and Being Seen in Portland, OR in 2020 and editing two documentary films around their work together. Stand Up, Show Up, Own Up and Standing Together.

KT Williams (she/her) is a contemporary dancer, educator, choreographer, and dance filmmaker based in Greensboro, NC. kt earned her BFA from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she received the Donald Carducci Memorial Scholarship Award for overall excellence in dance performance, and in May 2023, she received her MFA in Dance from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. kt’s pedagogical and creative processes are somatically-informed, and encourage an exploration of self, boundaries, and relationship; her embodied practice places a high priority on internal reflection and questions how she exists in relation to her surrounding environment. 

Margaret Guay is a BMC® Teacher, Practitioner and Massage Therapist with a private practice in Northampton, Ma. She is an artist whose illustrations are in The Basic Neurocellular Patterns by Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. Creating art has been an essential part of her learning, developing, experiencing and expressing the many and varied somatic experiences of life!

Martha Eddy, CMA, RSMT, EdD, was among the first to teach a somatic approach to dance beginning in the 1980s. She also incorporated the yoga she was learning when joining Bonnie at Jeannie Erlbaums yoga classes in South Amherst MA. She published Mindful Movement - The Evolution of the Somatic Arts and Conscious Action which speaks to somatic approaches to dance, health, education and social justice. Moving For LIfe and BodyMind Dancing are two systems with over 50 teachers around the world. Each grows out of Dynamic Embodiment - her form of Somatic Movement Education and Therapy, combining knowledge from her direct studies with Irmgard Bartenieff (Laban/Bartenieff Movement Studies) and Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen (Body-Mind Centering®) starting in 1976.

Miroslav Petrovic is a TedX speaker, teacher, facilitator and founder of The Enlivened Speaking Institute. He has worked with over 5,000 people across the world supporting them to bring their message to the world. He teaches how to go beyond didactic teaching to create transmission in an embodied way that is enlivening and engaging for audiences. His message and 'off the beaten path' approach speaks to thought leaders, future visionaries, progressive educators and transformational leaders who are empowered to move away from traditional teaching methodologies and embrace a deeper embodied approach. 

Olive Bieringa is a dance, performance and visual artist working at the intersection of social and creative practice, pedagogy, and healing. Born in Aotearoa, she is a first generation New Zealander. She moved to Oslo in 2017 from the USA where she was based for twenty years. She studied at the European Dance Development Center in the Netherlands and completed her Master in Fine Arts in Performance and New Media from Long Island University in Brooklyn, New York. She is a Registered ISMETA Somatic Movement Therapist, Somatic Movement Educator,  Somatic Movement Dance Educator and a Certified Practitioner and Teacher of Body-Mind Centering®, Shiatsu practitioner and certified DanceAbility teacher, working with performers of all abilities. She is the Program Director for Somatic Education Australasia's Body-Mind Centering® program in Melbourne, Australia.

Paula Josa-Jones is a dance and performance artist who brings an improvisational perspective to all of her work. She is a Certified Laban Movement Analyst (CLMA), and a Registered Somatic Movement Educator and Therapist (RSMET). She is a Guild-certified Tellington TTEAM practitioner and a Somatic Experiencing® practitioner. Her writings on movement and dance have been published in Contact Quarterly for the past 30 years. Her book, Our Horses, Ourselves: Discovering the Common Body was published by Trafalgar Square Books in 2017. As the creator of Embodied Equine Experiencing™ she teaches an intuitive, improvisational approach to the human-horse bond with movement and touch, as well as riding and performing with her horses Izarra and Blue.

Sandrine Harris is an embodiment and meditation facilitator, Somatic Experiencing® Practitioner, Feldenkrais® Practitioner, dancer, and trauma and chronic pain educator. She has been involved with somatic praxis for several decades, offering trainings, workshops and retreats internationally since 2008. She maintains a private practice in Massachusetts, where she lives, as well as online, working with folx globally. Her dynamic process is collectively named Emergent Nature, to reflect the innate quality of emergence — through being and becoming in an embodied state — that informs our capacity for vitality of expression, playfulness and curiosity, neurobiological resilience, and sensing connection. 

Shakti Smith is a Somatic Movement Educator, Registered 500 Hour Yoga Teacher, Dynamic Embodiment Therapist, Sound Healer, and founder of Prema Soma Healing Arts in Brooklyn. She served on the faculty at The Swedish Institute College of Health Sciences, Movement Research, and the Muscular Therapy Institute. She developed the courses Integrating Chakras into your Bodywork Practice, Movement for Bodyworkers, Medicine Dance, and FALLing into Nature. A long time member of ISMETA and Yoga Alliance, Shakti teaches Contact Improv & Authentic Movement, and has been teaching and practicing the Sun Salutation for 35 years. She developed a somatic approach to yoga that integrates shamanic earth-based practices, developmental movement, and awareness of the chakral/neuroendocrine bridge.

Sylvia Maes, BMC® Practitioner, is fascinated by the body. A first class in 1984 with Bonnie articulating brain patterns into developmental bodily movements continues to inspire her to further Body-Mind Centering® explorations. Currently she is researching water and other small molecules of life. She has assisted in many BMC® classes and trainings most recently as a chat fairy in Bonnie's online classes. She practices in person and online in Western Massachusetts at Healing Hands- Movement Therapy.

Tal Halevi is a choreographer, dancer and teacher based in New York City. She has performed and taught in the United States, Europe, Israel and Canada. A registered somatic movement educator and a certified teacher and practitioner of Body-Mind Centering®, for the past 30 years she has maintained a private practice exploring awareness in the body as a source for physical well-being, personal insight and creative expression. Her articles, "The Anatomy of Risk (2013), "The Forms Things Take: Dance as Somatic Exploration” (2017) were both published in Currents magazine.

Tarina Quelho is a professional member of BMCA. She is a Teacher of BMC® in the Brazil program and a choreographer/ director and instructor at the University level.

Toni Smith, M.F.A., is a choreographer & dance activist in the Capital Region of New York. She served as the Artistic Director of the National Museum of Dance & dance faculty for Skidmore College over 2 decades. Toni is a founding member of the NYS DanceForce, a 25 year old task force that has raised 7 million dollars for projects that promote dance literacy throughout New York State. She currently teaches BMC®, movement and yoga to all ages and abilities. Toni is a Body-Mind Centering® Practitioner and Infant Development Movement Educator with a private practice in upstate NY and on line. Toni is the Chair of the BMCA Conference Committee and regularly offers BMC® classes online.

Wendy Hambidge is a certified Body-Mind Centering® Practitioner and Teacher, Registered Somatic Movement Educator and Therapist, and an Infant Developmental Movement Educator. As an artist, she produced dance work for 30 years and holds an MFA in choreography and performance. Wendy first encountered Body-Mind Centering® in 1990 where she found it to radiate with possibility for self-study, movement, and choreography. She currently teaches Experiential Anatomy for The People’s Yoga Teacher Training Program, and the School for Body-Mind Centering® Licensed Programs. She has been collaborating with Damaris Webb and Jorge Samuel since 2018 through performance and film on Standing Together and Stand up Show up Own up, works that engage with issues of race, ancestry and social justice.

Onsite Presenters

Amelia Zelda Ender, MA, CMA, DTR, BMC®-licensed teacher since 1991 knew from early in life that dance, movement and a body-based perspective would play a defining role in her perceptual and operational base. A quest for meaning, expression and justice guided a path shaped by the experience and world-view of her parents and family of Holocaust survivors. A Dancer, Movement Educator and Dance Movement Therapist in the boroughs of NYC, Amelia was a clinician in special needs schools and programs, hospitals and psychiatric facilities; she directed a creative movement and arts program for early childhood at the 53rd st. YWCA; she worked and trained with Dr. Yael Danieli, Director of the Group Project for Holocaust Survivors and their Children, editing cutting edge research papers on trauma, and the intergenerational transmission of trauma. She has taught for the School of  Body-Mind Centering® Antioch University and Springfield College. Amelia currently serves as a Jewish Chaplain and Program Coordinator within the Office of Community and Belonging, which promotes the work of equity and inclusion in a diverse student body.

Annie Brook, somatic author, educator, and practitioner, has over 40 years working clinically to support embodied change with families, individuals, and children. She shares geeky somatic tools and tips around the globe. Her specialty is precognitive memory, her method, Applied Neuroplasticity tm. Annie founded the Brook Institute to train therapists to help clients release dissociation and process life events via the body story so one can enjoy these precious moments of life with resiliency.

Austin Selden graduated from the University of Michigan with a BFA in Dance. He is certified in mat pilates, is a Licensed Massage Therapist, has taken five BMC® courses and is pursuing his Visceral Manipulation certificate. He danced with Shen Wei dance arts for six years, and has worked with other NYC based choreographers. He has been co-creating with Sarah Konner since 2007, and hopes to keep doing so. He has lived in Brooklyn since 2011.

Betsy Wetzig, dancer, movement researcher, educator. Since 1971, Betsy has applied the neuromuscular tension patterns’ functions of awareness, creativity, and coordination to Dance, the Arts, Pilates, Style, the improvisational work of InterPlay™, Culture and more, she founded Wetzig Coordination Patterns™ & Behavioral Dynamics Training and co-developed Psyche-Soma Dynamics (Dr. Mary Alice Long) and Full Potential Learning (Dr. Patricia Pinciotti). Co-author of Move to Greatness: Focusing the Four Essential Energies of a Whole and Balanced Leader with Ginny Whitelaw, she consulted on the creation of the FEBI® (Focus Energy Balance Indicator). Her work is included in Constance Schrader’s A Sense Of Dance: Exploring Your Movement Potential, and Anne Gilbert's Brain-Compatible.

Christine Cole, RSMT, the founder and director of Somatic Body Training Program, is an expert in the embodiment of human development. On the leading edge of research about somatic movement education and therapy, she displays a radical trust in embodied experience as the primary way for groups to co-create knowledge. A teacher of Body-Mind Centering®, Practitioner of Integrative Acupressure and Infinity Healing, she has taught at the School for Body-Mind Centering® and brought her teaching worldwide.

Cynthia J Williams, BFA University of Utah, MFA Connecticut College, is a Professor of Dance at HWS Colleges where she teaches dance technique, composition, improvisation, dance history and dance criticism/embodied writing. Cynthia is a certified Evans technique teacher, co-chairs the Dance Area Studies of the PCA, and directs the Somatic Dance Conference & Performance Festival in Geneva, NY. She has performed in commissioned works by Bill Evans, Paula Josa Jones and Claire Porter and has been a student of BMC® since the 1980s. Cynthia is currently working on a book about choreographer Jane Comfort.

Cynthia Stevens INSITU slips into swamps, streams and forests to explore the inter-relationship of the body, community and environment through site-based performance and media. Over the past 40 years her work has been presented in the United States, Canada, Europe and New Zealand including site-specific performances in the Kröller-Muller Sculpture Garden, Netherlands, and in Muir Woods National Monument, California for its Centennial. Cynthia has a BS in Natural Resources/Wildlife Ecology and is a certified Somatic Movement Educator and Practitioner of Body-Mind Centering®.   

David France is a wandering monk currently based at the San Francisco Zen Center. Interested in exploring movement through a broad lens, his lessons are eclectic and interdisciplinary. Currently his practice focuses on Butoh, Contact Improvisation, freediving, Shorinji Kempo, and taoist yoga. He has been living in Japan for the last 15 years teaching yoga and BMC® and researching Japanese body-mind practices. He teaches in the Sonder Movement Projects SME program.  

Dawn Karlovsky is the Founder and Director of Karlovsky & Company Dance, a St. Louis-based contemporary modern dance company and 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization. Karlovsky’s movement language is somatically inspired emphasizing the detailed use of touch and spatial and sensory awareness. Dawn is a nationally certified teacher of the Alexander Technique (AmSAT) since 2004. She teaches Modern Dance, Somatic Education, and The Alexander Technique at Washington University, in the Department of Dance and for the Department of Music at Webster University in St. Louis, and maintains a private teaching practice in the Alexander Technique. Dawn holds a MFA in Choreography from the University of Utah and BA in Dance Performance from Northern Illinois University.

Debra Corea, RYT, inspired by her explorations, experience and trainings in yoga, meditation, Continuum Movement®, and Koru Mindfulness® has been encouraging student’s self-discovery in her courses (Living Anatomy, Living Yoga; Into the Present Moment; and Embodied Resourcing Through Somatic Practices) in the Mind-Body Somatics Cluster within the Program of Dance and ​Movement at the University of Rochester over the past 12 years. 

Elaine Colandrea explores how the somatic arts shape consciousness, informing and inspiring the creative process as well as fostering connections between self, others and nature that organically create a more humane world. Artistic Director of Watermark Arts, as well as a movement artist, Continuum teacher, somatic educator and massage therapist, her work has been deeply influenced by her association with Emilie Conrad, founder of Continuum. Her abiding passion is bringing people together to directly experience the body's transformative capacity. With Rori Smith, Elaine co-authored “The Elemental Body: A Movement Guide to Kinship with Ourselves and the Natural World.”

Elizabeth Mackenzie is a professional member of the Dance Therapy Association of Australasia (DTAA). Elizabeth initially was impacted by the work of Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen in reading her articles in Contact Quarterly magazine. Elizabeth has studied with Bonnie since her workshops in Melbourne in 2016 and in California in 2017 and 2019. Elizabeth has trained to Level 2 in IFS, and is a graduate of the Hakomi Method of mindful psychotherapy. Elizabeth teaches yoga and meditation and works as Activities Coordinator at Prague House, Melbourne, whose residents have usually experienced homelessness. Elizabeth formerly directed Move with Your Baby, a community dance therapy program in Melbourne, AU, focused on the mother and baby connection. 

Ellen Barlow, a founding member of the Body-Mind Centering® Association, has been applying the awareness and wellness practices of BMC® in dance, fitness, yoga, and physical therapy since the mid-1980’s. She is a certified Practitioner and Teacher of Body-Mind Centering®, a Certified GYROTONIC® and GYROKINESIS® Trainer, and a Registered Somatic Movement Educator (RSME - ISMETA), currently serving on the board of directors of the International Somatic Movement Education and Therapy Association (ISMETA). She resides in Washington DC where she maintains a private practice and works at Elements Fitness & Wellness Center as a Senior Instructor and Physical Therapy Aide.

Emily Healy (she/her) is a mover and beekeeper. She has a BA in Environmental Studies from Ithaca College and currently teaches aerial and acrobatic arts at Circus Culture in Ithaca, NY.

Eva Maes, after obtaining a Master in History, Eva studied at Cunningham Dance Studio (NY). In 2003 she met Lisa Nelson´s ´Tuning Scores´, and started her studies at the School for Body-Mind Centering®, where she graduated as Practitioner (2006, USA), and as certified BMC® Teacher (2019, IT). Collaborations in dance include Chantal Yzermans/Radical Low and Anouk Llaurens. She loves fluctuating between diverse educational, artistic and research environments. Both her project ´Embodiment Embroidery´ which she concluded in 2021 within the Master Dance- program at the Royal Conservatoire Antwerp, as well as the research project ´Transmitting the Body´ which she developed within the CORPoREAL-platform, allowed her to further explore ´embodiment´ and ´transmission´ as core themes of Dance.

Faye Berton is a somatic-based yoga teacher with the highest certification through Yoga Alliance. After decades of teaching traditional asana, she developed the Fluid Strength Yoga Practice. She is certified through the Ayurvedic Institute, published in Light on Ayurveda and served on the board of the Minnesota Ayurveda Association. A certified Feldenkrais practitioner, she has also explored other somatic work with masters such as Marjorie Barstow, Emile Conrad, Charlotte Selver, Else Middendorf and Ruthy Alon. She founded the Laurel Yoga Studio in Minnesota and the Casa Lalita Retreat Center in Mexico. Faye has authored two books: Embodied Ayurveda for Yoga Practitioners: Increasing the Healing Potential of Yoga, and The Fluid Strength Yoga Practice: Vitalizing the Body and Resting the Mind.

Florence Poulain is a Body-Mind Centering® SME and a Butoh dancer. Florence builds her costumes and sets, she photographed dancers first and has been exploring movement in the community. Florence worked in professional film and video production in NYC and as a Creative Arts / Activities Therapist in Emergency in-patients Psychiatry and Emergency Substance Abuse Detox unit at the Kingston NY HealthAlliance Hospital. Florence lives and works with her partner Kristopher Johnson, photographer, and they run Deep Tanks Studio, a visual and performance arts space in Kingston, NY.

Hannah Park is an associate professor, director of the dance program, and assistant chair of Arts and Languages Department at Iona University, NY, where she also serves as the artistic director of the residential dance ensemble. Her current research interests encompass dance and creative processes—the application of Laban Movement Analysis, Bartenieff Fundamentals, and somatics in dance education, integrated arts education, community engagement and social entrepreneurship. She holds a PhD in dance education from Temple University, an MFA in dance performance and choreography from Tisch NYU, and a BFA in dance performance and choreography from the SUNY Purchase. Hannah is a somatic practitioner certified in Laban Movement Analysis and Body Mind Dancing.

Ildiko Viczian has a degree and experience in visual art and design, certification from the School of Body-Mind Centering® as Practitioner and Teacher in 1993, certification of CranioSacral Therapy, SomatoEmotional Release, and Visceral Manipulation. She studied Kinetic Awareness, then anatomy and kinesiology at NYU. Ildiko was commissioned Presenter of Centering Prayer by Contemplative Outreach in 2005.. She facilitates two Centering prayer groups, teaches BMC® based movement, Somatic-Spiritual Awareness, Contemplative Movement, Embodied Prayer in New York, US and Europe, in person, on line and speaks English, German, French, Hungarian.

Jan Cook is an ordained Buddhist meditation teacher and Body Mind Centering® practitioner. She has taught in the Dance Program for 12 years and shares her rich background in somatics and transformation with various populations in the community, corporate groups, and educational organizations. She has created a series of courses called Meditating from the Body.​ 

Jey Hiott, PhD (Applied Psychology, NYU) MA in Humanistic Psychology (West Georgia) Movement and Eastern Psychology study at Naropa Institute. In her late 20's, Jey discovered her love of dance. Having watched Post Modern Dance and Contact Improvisation on SC Educational TV, she moved from the south at 30 to study and experience Contact Improv. Ending up in NYC for 15 years, Jey learned of Bonnie and studied in-person with her as much as possible. From the beginning, Jey appreciated the psychological implications of BMC® teachings. Those principles and way of "seeing" have become an integral part of her practice. A Certified IFS Therapist and Approved Clinical Consultant, Jey has a private practice in Asheville, NC and has assisted in IFS trainings in the US, AU, and the UK.

Julie Nathanielsz, MFA, is eternally interested in how we are composing ourselves in life, art and culture from the ground of bodily intelligence. Across multiple mediums, her work is lately devoted to generating opportunities to explore our sensual and storied connection to place, and its inherent possibilities for reciprocity, relationship, and repair. Julie has taught movement, dance and contemplative practice independently for 20 years, as well as for Texas State University, Austin Community College, and Cornell University, bringing a critical lens to classes in technique, improvisation, and experiential anatomy. She is a certified teacher of Skinner Releasing at Introductory and On-Going levels, and a student of the Amerta movement work of Javanese master teacher, Suprapto Suryodarmo.

Kate Tarlow Morgan, choreographer, author, and teacher is editor-in-chief of Currents Journal for the Body-Mind Centering® Association, and editorial consultant for Lost & Found Poetics Document Initiative at C.U.N.Y-Center for Humanities. As sole archivist of The Rhythms Fundamentals, based on the study of human and animal natural movement, Kate is teaching teachers specialist at The City and Country School in NYC and Brattleboro School of Dance, in Vermont She is working on a tome for 15 years entitled, Learning the Fundamentals: A Natural History of Movement in the Progressive Era.

Lauree Wise, M.S./OTR, CMA, IDME, Lauree has engaged in exploring the realm of body mind spirit integration for much of her life. A long time ago, as a philosophy major and dancer in college, she wrote her senior paper, entitled, A Mind Body View of the Self.  She became a certified Laban Movement Analyst (‘85) and is a Body Mind Centering practitioner (‘94). For the past 21 years, she has been working as a pediatric occupational therapist (‘2000), specializing in sensory-motor integration. About 30 years ago, she met Arny Mindell, the founder of Process Work and participated in a four-year program with Aileen Crow, integrating process work and authentic movement. She facilitated a weekly Process group for people with life-threatening illnesses. Lauree is on the faculty for the Spanda Yoga Movement Therapy training and has taught in other somatic oriented programs. In her private practice, she enjoys ‘following the process’ with people of all ages.

Lillian Stamey is a registered Somatic Movement Educator and Therapist. She studies the living-body through organic inquiry, somatic practice, teaching, writing, dance-making, performance, and assisting the healing process for others. She is endlessly fascinated by the interplay of body and consciousness. Lillian received a master’s degree in Dance and Somatic Well-being: Connections to the Living Body from University of Central Lancashire and granted professional membership with ISMETA. Lillian explores various containers to guide others through 1:1 sessions, group workshops, and online education. She has been sharing her love and expertise of body movement & awareness practices for over 10 years. Lillian provides immersive, creative, and dynamic learning environments for self-exploration. 

Linda Tumbarello is the founder of the Tumbarello Approach to healing and education which integrates Body-Centered Psychotherapy, Bodywork, and Movement. She began studying with Bonnie Cohen in 1973, and taught at the School for Body Mind Centering® in Amherst for 30 years. Since 1991, she has been teaching in the Dynamic Embodiment Program with Dr. Martha Eddy. Linda is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and Certified Body-Mind Centering® Teacher. The author of “The Heart of Self-Care: A Women’s Guide to Joyful Living and Well-Being”, and “Joyful Sexuality for Women”, she is currently writing Self-Care in the Hard Times. Linda offers individual sessions, healing retreats, supervision, and mentoring in Northampton, MA, and virtually.

Lindsay Gilmour is a choreographer, filmmaker, and educator. Her work explores presence, ritual, and the body’s relationship with the natural world. She combines the mystical, somatic and scientific looking deeply into what it means to be human in the 21st century. Her most recent works delve into embodying local landscapes and express the  need for wild untamed spaces. Lindsay is the recipient of a Nehru Fulbright Award for Academic and Professional Excellence (2018) and a Hellman Fellowship (2020-2021), which supports her research exploring the preservation, adaptation, and innovation of Ritual Dance in Vajrayana Buddhist Nunneries and Monasteries in India. She is interested in embodied knowledge and exploring what ancient dances share with contemporary somatic movement practice.

Lorelie Bond, an explorer of many disciplines from scientific research journals to music, movement and flying, she is a psychiatric RN, a Somatic Movement Educator and a Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapist. After 20 years of somatic movement study and research with Christine Cole, she especially enjoys collaboration on topics in embryology and inner and outer ecosystems.

Maren Waldman is a dance artist, educator, bodyworker, entrepreneur, and community organizer. She facilitates multi-disciplinary, intergenerational dance and environmental arts projects in collaboration with community groups, municipal sectors, scientists, and artists. Maren earned her MFA in Dance Performance and Choreography from CU Boulder, holds a BA in cultural Anthropology from Haverford College, is a licensed massage therapist and has a certificate in Permaculture Design. She has offered dance classes, private lessons, and healing arts to her communities since 2007 and led a community college dance program in Colorado for 5 years. Maren’s mission is to contribute to a future where care for Body and stewardship of Earth weave together to generate healing change.

Margery Segal is a Dance Artist, Writer, Somatic Movement & Psychotherapist with a specialty in early development and Pre and Perinatal Birth Attachment Therapy. Currently, she directs The Somatic Child Integrative Practitioner Program at Aqua Springs, Texas near Austin & in Sao Paulo, Brasil. She has a private practice and leads Rebel Women's Embodiment Groups and Intensives. Some of her Certifications include: Body Mind Centering® Practitioner and Teacher IDME Licensed Counselor/MA in Counseling Psychology Registered Somatic Movement Therapist w/ ISMETA Infant Developmental Movement Educator® Rhythmic Movement & Reflex Integration Certificate Internal Family Systems Therapist Skinner Releasing Dance Educator.

Mariah Maloney is an award-winning filmmaker and artistic director of Mariah Maloney Dance, an organization dedicated to presenting Maloney’s interdisciplinary collaborations. Originally from Homer, Alaska, Mariah is a former Trisha Brown Dance Company soloist and ensemble dancer. Current research explores the intersectionality of Irish Traditional music and dance forms and live music culture in dialogue with postmodern improvisation practices. Mariah’s research comes together with artists across disciplines in collaboration with composers, poets and visual artists. Her movement practice is deeply informed by the study of Body-Mind Centering®, Alexander Technique and Improvisation. Maloney leads classes at Movement Research and is an Associate Professor in the Department of Dance, SUNY Brockport.

Mary Ann Rund (aka Reis), MFA, SME, IDME is a dance artist and educator in the fields of dance, yoga and somatic movement whose work is greatly influenced by her Body-Mind Centering® (BMC®) training with Maryska Bigos and Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen as well as exchanges with BMC® colleagues. She has taught dance and somatic movement for several decades at institutions including Washington University and Webster University in St. Louis, MO. Currently Mary Ann is engaged in assisting with the furthering of developmental skills for a toddler with brain stem damage. 

Matthew Nelson is a spiritual choreographer devoted to connecting people with the divine intelligence of their bodies. More at www.soma.works.

Megan Nicely is an artist/scholar whose research involves choreographic experimentation through the medium of the body. She combines critical dance and performance studies theory and philosophy with physical practice in release-based dance, Japanese butoh, and somatics. Nicely has published in TDR, Choreographic Practices, Performance Research Journal, and others. Her company Megan Nicely/Dance has performed on both U.S. coasts, in the U.K., and in Europe. She is currently Associate Professor and Chair of Performing Arts and Social Justice/Dance at University of San Francisco, a program that focuses on the arts and social change. Her book Experimental Dance and the Somatics of Language is forthcoming from Palgrave. www.megannicelydance.org

MelindaJoy Pattinson, a native of New Mexico, is a Psychotherapist in private practice, having graduated with her Masters of Counseling from Southwestern College, in Santa Fe. She specializes in creating healthy relationships with clients using the principles of Interpersonal Neurobiology, Harm Reduction Therapy, Creative Arts and Somatic modalities, as appropriate. MelindaJoy has varied experience as a workshop presenter, speaker and teacher for over twenty years.

Michelle LaVigne teaches rhetoric and communication at Cornell University. She writes about the persuasiveness of dance and how rhetorical practices can be rethought from dance. Her scholarly and critical work was published in the Oxford Handbook on Contemporary Ballet, TDR, Quarterly Journal of Speech, Text and Performance Quarterly. She is currently working on a manuscript about the potential persuasiveness of repetition by looking at how (and why) some Western concert dances in contemporary culture (i.e. The Nutcracker and Alvin Ailey’s Revelations) repeat. The manuscript’s central argument maintains that the circulation and repetition of dances are important identifiers of cultural normativity and disruption, which can and should be understood as rhetorical forces.

Missy Pfohl Smith directs the Program of Dance and Movement and Institute for the Performing Arts at University of Rochester, as well as the collaborative repertory company BIODANCE. Her teaching practice draws from somatic dance practices, Bill Evans pedagogy, an eclectic background in contemporary modern dance and an active and collaborative creative and choreographic​ practice.  

Ryuta Iwashita (they/them) currently lives and improvises in Bulbancha (also colonially known as New Orleans). Ryuta  was a movement/performance/visual artist and educator  living in Japan for 25 years. Their artistic lexicons are rooted in social justice, somatics, martial arts, child education, and ancestral work including 祖体 (SOTAI) of which Ryuta is its conceiver. Their work and teaching moves and responds to juxtapositions of phenomena, systems, and galaxies, such as the one between their Japanese heritage and their westernized life in the Southern US, or between a day of organic farming and a night of MSG-heavy instant noodles, or the relationship between their internal organs and their ancestors moving and pausing as stars.

Sara K. Vogeler, BMC®, RSMT, LMT, AOMT, MFLCI, founded and directs The NeuroMuscular Center, Inc. in NYC for natural pain relief. She met Bonnie in 1973 as a student at NYU where she began a life-long study in Body-Mind Centering® and taught in the summer intensives. After apprenticing with Erick Hawkins, she toured Europe and the U.S. with David Woodberry and taught BMC® in Amsterdam before founding her center in 1990 in NYC. She has almost 50 years of experience in helping others improve from sports injuries, developmental delays, TBI, TMJ, RSI, neck and back pain. She raised a child with ADHD and ODD, and eagerly published her knowledge as an online course to help others in their journey! https://app.mastermind.com/masterminds/37888

Sarah Konner is a dance artist, improviser and Somatic Movement Educator. She creates dance-theater work and has had the pleasure of working with Austin Selden, Jeanine Durning, Jenna Riegel, Sara Shelton Mann, Chavasse Dance & Performance, and setGo Performance Improvisation. Sarah teaches Body-Mind Centering®, contact improvisation and contemporary dance in the US and internationally— currently on faculty at Wesleyan University, Amherst College, Smith College, and Movement Research. Sarah holds an MFA in Dance at Smith College, a BFA in Dance and a BS in Environmental Science from the University of Michigan, and is certified in Yoga, Pilates, and Body-Mind Centering®. www.SarahandAustinDance.com

Trude Cone, originally from the US, has lived 46 years in Amsterdam, Netherlands. She came to the Netherlands as a dancer, worked as a choreographer, dance teacher, founder of two dance performance spaces, and dance educator. She has retired after 43 years working for the Amsterdam University of the Arts (AHK), the last 15 years as student coach for students from all faculties studying at the AHK. She has a private practice working with adults Moving Thought. She is a certified Body Mind Centering® Practitioner, Neuro Physiological Psychological (INPP) therapist, and Rhythmical Movement Consultant, specialising in early movement patterns and learning strategies. She is a member of ISMETA AND BMCA.

Remote Presenters & Video Performers

Amal ElWardi lives on the line of paradox. Within microcosms of movement, her body’s perceptions of connection are revealed in places where dualities meet, and converse; resonating stoic stillness and aliveness. Vibration is the means by which Amal finds frequency and attunes with places, others, and her own self systems. Using dance and specific somatic tools, Amal holistically immerses the body in her native lands and accesses authentic places of “Being With”. Born in Casablanca, Morocco, Amal ElWardi is an MFA in Dance candidate at Saint Mary’s College of California, cultivating creative practice in somatic education. Her research has been informed by somatic seminars curated by professors Rosana Barragan and Elizebeth Randall Rains, including guests Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, Sondra Fraleigh, and Martha Eddy.

Anja Bornšek graduated from Salzburg Contemporary Dance Academy and HfMDK Frankfurt University and received an SME certification in Body-Mind Centering® method. Her artistic focus is shaped by her decade-long experiences in somatic studies and performative methodologies, which focus on embodiment, body states and communicative potentials in the context of the stage. Anja has deeply invested in facilitating and developing a pedagogic/artistic format intended for audiences prior to a performance called Physical Introduction. Through it, she is creating a space for practising embodied watching/witnessing, questioning the set ways of viewing dance and building possibilities for a more physically felt experience that can emerge between an audience and the performance.

Ann Moradian is a movement artist, educator, writer and advocate for systemic health. As a researcher, her work explores mindful movement in relation to its social, cultural and ecological environments. Current projects include a ‘social choreography’ for transformative creative practice, and a collective interdisciplinary effort facilitating discourse and exchange among scientists, clinicians and movement experts. She has danced with Anna Sokolow’s Players’ Project and Perspectives In Motion, which she has directed and choreographed for since its founding in 1988. Ann holds an MA in Dance Education, a BA in Art & Society, a diplôme universitaire en Danse, Improvisation & Créativité and certificates in Systems Thinking, Social Design, Yoga and Kinomichi (an Aikido-based martial art).

Bernadett Jobbágy is a Budapest based choreographer, performer and multimedia artist. She graduated as Landscape Architect at Corvinus University of Budapest. Later she studied in the Budapest Contemporary Dance Academy, and then completed an audio-description study program at the University of Theatre and Film Arts. She works as an independent artist, movement pedagogue and filmmaker, mainly in project-based structure, along collaborations. Her defining background in movement is contemporary dance and improvisation, Body-Mind Centering®, Tai Chi and Qigong. As a member of ArtMan Association, inclusive performing art practice is also part of her work. In 2021 she finished film editing study in Lumiere Film School. Currently she is a researcher artist at the Doctoral School of HUFA.

Bob Lehnberg received his certification as Practitioner of Body-Mind Centering® (BMC®) in 1990, and in 2002 Teacher of Body-Mind Centering®. Since then, Bob has received teacher certifications for BMC® Yoga, Integral Yoga and Supreme Science of Qigong. He has been teaching in schools of massage therapy and programs of somatic training since 1990 and has had the good fortune to teach BMC® and somatic practices throughout the US, Europe, Canada, China, and Taiwan. Bob has been on faculty teaching and coordinating the BMC® Somatic Movement Educator and Practitioner certification programs since 2007. He is co-director of the SME program in Taiwan, and faculty for the BMC® Yoga Immersion Series. Bob teaches EmbryoQi and other qigong practices both online and in-person.

Caryn Heilman was authorized by Emilie Conrad after a 20 year mentorship in Continuum. Caryn was introduced to Continuum midway through her ten year career as a modern dancer with the Paul Taylor Dance Company.  Caryn is the artistic director of LiquidBody, a dance company.  She teaches movement online and in Greece at Bouros Seaview Retreat and creates audience interactive multidisciplinary dances and media art. Caryn has an MFA in Dance and Media and teaches Movement Story at School of Visual Arts.

Cathy Boyce holds a BSc in Kinesiology and is a NASM Personal Trainer, Certified Fitness Appraiser, Spinning and Pilates Instructor. As an Osteopathic Practitioner with Post Graduate work in Biodynamic and Pediatric Osteopathy she specializes  in Primary Movements and Primitive Reflexes. Boyce has developed a movement practice known as Begin Moves that engages innate movement patterns in a sequential flow to improve the function and structure of the mind and body. As a Pediatric Osteopath she teaches parents how to support developmental movements of the infant through Purposeful Play; a way of ensuring optimal baseline neural networks and healthy curves of the spine.in Primary Movements and Primitive Reflexes. 

Dana Lyn, a Brooklyn-based musician, has performed at New York’s Lincoln Center, Beacon Theater, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Carnegie Hall and Town Hall, as well as folk festivals and dive bars the world over. A violinist/fiddler, violist, pianist and enthusiastic bass player, she is at home in a wide range of musical genres. Dana is an alum of the Joe’s Pub Working Group, and was recently awarded a 2020 NYFA Women’s Fund Award for Media, Music and Theater and a Sundance Composer Lab Fellow in 2021.

Elizabeth DeLaBarre is a BMC® practitioner, IDME, RYT, Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, and Continuum Teacher. She is Techniques certified in CranioSacral Therapy and has had a Manual Therapy and Somatic Movement practice in NYC for more than 25 years. She is currently working towards certification in The Fajardo Method of Holistic Biomechanics, the only modality she offers.

Erika Paez Manjarres Certification Somatic Movement educator, Nov 2021. Trained & assisted Donna Farhi. Somatic Coach with Lisa Petersen. Arrived as a refugee in the UK, 1990 from Colombia. Worked in Latin America/Africa/Asia for 30 years as human rights lawyer -Womankind, Save the Children, HIV/AIDS. Wrote book Integrate Child Girl Soldiers. Studied in a school based in critical pedagogic, theology liberation. Something Erika understood better when doing her masters, Women’s Studies, learning from authors like bell hooks: lived experience of marginalised groups. Later this resonated when doing BMC® programme. Massage 1997 & Yoga teacher 2008:women & transgender people from marginalised communities. 2021 set up trainingYSA: combining social justice & body-mind experiences for women leaders.

Fiona Harrisson is a senior lecturer in landscape architecture at RMIT University, a practising designer, a contemplative teacher and a passionate gardener. She is a student in the Body-Mind Centering® Somatic Movement Educator program at Somatic Education Australasia.

Heike Kuhlmann, dancer, choreographer, RSDME, Body-Mind Centering®-SME, Practitioner Programme, MA Choreography, Diploma IBMT, actual somatic research on menstruation and cycle. 2010-2021 Global Water Dances Performance collective Berlin. Teacher in the somatic movement education programme of the Somatische Akademie Berlin. Facilitating cultural education projects. For Heike art, movement, somatics and activism are aspects of the same thing- expression of being alive. Heike locates herself in between. Being alive is being in cha(n/r)ge. heikekuhlmann.net

Ivan Vuković is a BMC® Somatic Movement Educator and Yoga teacher from Zagreb, Croatia. After graduating English and Spanish language and literature at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb, he dedicated himself to the exploration of consciousness and movement. He became a Yoga of Heart teacher in 2016, after which he started his ongoing study of BMC®. He is also a hip-hop musician with over 20 years of experience and has so far released 14 studio albums.

Kim Sargent-Wishart (PhD, RSME/T) is an artist, researcher, educator & writer specializing in somatic education, physical practices, somatic writing & contemplative photography. Research interests include experiential embryology and physiology as models for creative practice, and modes presence and perception. A Certified Teacher of Body-Mind Centering® and Registered Somatic Movement Educator & Therapist (ISMETA), Kim has practiced movement education and bodywork since the early 1990s. Her arts practice is influenced by Miksang contemplative photography and dance/movement improvisation. Kim is the co-editor of The Art of Embodiment (2021), co-founder of ASTER Association, and co-director of Somatic Education Australasia (SEA). kimsargentwishart.com

Kyra Lober is the creator of Body Being & Heart, Transformational Arts, Healing for Body, and Spirit. She is also the author of Adventures of Alice Wonderbar. Alice is, of course, a magical healer! Kyra has taught Reiki Distant Healing for over thirty years and assists Dr. Ken Koles Ph.D., Lac, DSc, CST-D in his distance healing courses Frequencies and Vibration. Kyra Lober was a dancer and choreographer receiving good reviews in the New York Times when she got ill. Doctors forgot to tell her it was incurable. She got well and became a Practitioner and Teacher of BMC®, Teacher of Feldenkrais Awareness through Movement, CranioSacral Therapist, and Practitioner of Shiatsu. She is a graduate of the ‘Fame’ High School of Performing Arts and a graduate U.C.L.A with a B.A. and M.A. in Dance.

Lale Madenoglu is a dance artist, choreographer, contemporary dance & somatic awareness teacher based in Izmir/Turkey. She graduated from Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, Istanbul State Conservatory, Contemporary Dance Department. She performed her own choreographies nationally and internationally. In 2019, she attended her first workshop with Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen and volunteered at the 34th BMCA Annual Conference. Since then, she has been involved with BMC® and has been integrating dance and BMC® practices.

Dr. Leonard Cruz (PhD in Urban Education with a focus on the Performing and Creative Arts) was born in Pampanga, the Philippines and raised in San Antonio, Texas. They received his B.A. and M.A. Degrees in Dance from U.C.L.A., and later obtained their Master of Fine Arts in Performance/Choreography in 2009. Their PhD dissertation was on, “Laban Movement Analysis as a Methodology for Promoting Creativity and the Arts Across the Curriculum,” and successfully defended it in 2013. Dr. Cruz is the Founder of, “The Creative, Arts, and Resilience Project Network,” a platform for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), LGBTQUIA+, and Special Needs/Abilities Artists. Presently, Cruz is adjunct faculty at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts ITM/ICEM Department and HBK Essen, Germany.

Lilian Vilela is a dance artist and professor at the undergraduate and graduate levels in the area of ​​Performing Arts at the São Paulo State University (UNESP) in Brazil. Graduated in Dance and PhD in Education, trained as somatic movement educator -SME by the Body-Mind Centering®- BMC®. She is the author of published articles and books in the field of dance, performing arts and education. She is a creator and researcher of contemporary scenic body practices.

Lisa Dowler is an independent dance artist, researcher and SME, inspired by Contact Improvisation, Instant Composition and Body-Mind Centering®. Since 2006 she has been Dance Artist in Residence at Alder Hey Children's Hospital, UK. Her research includes one-to-one somatic dance sessions with infants, children and young people; large-scale public to intimate bespoke bedside performance; two research studies exploring the effects of somatics and improvisation for children with acute conditions/pain; a Somatic Dance App for parents and hospital staff and during the pandemic nature-inspired dance films and 'socially distanced’ dance/music performance with video projection. From 2007-15 she was a senior lecturer in dance at Edge Hill Uni, UK and is currently completing her PhD at C-DaRE, UK.

Lola Gonthier is a Dancing Artist & Painting Performer who lives in France. As a survivor of Narcolepsy she continually researches sleep regulation and pain release. Lola is also a Somatic Movement Educator.

Marghe Mills-Thysen began studying and working with Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen in the 1960’s. A certified BMC® teacher, IDME® graduate and co-author with Bonnie of Developmental Movement Therapy, Marghe trained with Moshe Feldenkrais in the 1980’s, the first practitioner certified in both BMC® and The Feldenkrais Method®. Creator of Feldenkrais® audio lessons, co-creator and artist for “Strengthening Your Immune System Through Mind & Movement”® video, her anatomical drawing illustrate Bonnie’s CQ interviews and Sensing, Feeling and Action, and books by Martha Eddy and Susan Bauer. Marghe has taught nationally for over fifty years in trainings, hospitals, universities, yoga, community and fitness centers. She currently practices from California with classes through Sebastopol’s Senior Center. Marghe’s background includes dance (from age 3), acting, directing, illustration and teaching. Marghe trained at New York University's Department of Physical Therapy, and with John Upledger, Suzuki Roshi, Yamada Sensei, and Pierre Pannetier. She holds a Masters degree in Education from Lesley University and Certification in Arts Therapies. Marghe thanks the BMCA® Conference’s organizers and is delighted to have this opportunity to pass on to the BMC® community her integration of two extraordinary somatic movement education approaches.  

Maria Helena Cespedes is a Certified Somatic Movement Educator at the CPC the organization where they work and implement self-care: The Centro de Promocion y Cultura CPC (a community-based organization) through Maria Helena Cespedes
 
Maria Cristina Cruz provided the main guidance around Self-care from a healing justice approach. The CPC has run community programs for 40 years from Kennedy a popular poor area in Bogota (1200000 habitants) with a focus on women, youth and children and have implement Self-care approach for more than 12 years including ex-combatants women from the guerrilla and other women affected by the armed conflict in Colombia. https://www.revistatribunacultural.com/centro-de-promocion-y-cultural.

Marie Foulatier has been immersed in BMC® for the past 15 years. Her foundational experience was the discovery of her legs looking for roots. Marie’s practice applies to babies, special needs and any ones. Her modalities include writing and movement, always seeking inspirations, limits and synchronicity. Marie Foulatier is an IDME Practitioner and coordinates a BMC® France association. Her goals include the dissemination of BMC® principles in political and social fields.

Marina Tsartsara is a BMC® Practitioner and Teacher, Dance & Visual Artist (MSc), Holistic Life Coach & Mindfulness teacher. Her research interest lies in the relationship between embodiment and visual art making. She named that research space Somatic Art Practice. In her performance work her practice explores embodied spectatorship and medical performance. https://www.somaticwellbeing.info

Mario Tanga, PhD in History of Science (University of Pisa, 2007), Degree in Philosophy (University of Siena, 2003), PET (University of Cambridge, Dec. 2001) Degree in Pedagogy (University of Siena, 1992) Postgraduate in Bioethics and Bio-Law (University of Siena, 2006), Ordinary member of the Accademia dei Fisiocritici (http://www.accademiafisiocritici.it/), Degree in Physical Education (University of Perugia, 1979), Speaker at numerous international conferences about body, Author of several books and articles (printed and online), Teacher in High School and at the University (History of the Body).

Marjorye Maciel is a native of the northeast of Brazil and is currently based in the SF Bay Area. She is a mother, dancer, and actor. Marjorye started her dance journey at seven through classical ballet technique training. She later initiated her studies in theatre, belly dance, and contemporary dance. She obtained a BA in Dance Studies from the Federal University of Ceará (UFC) in Brazil and is pursuing her MFA in Dance: Creative Practice at St. Mary 's College of California. She has dance films exhibited in film festivals in Brazil, including dança em foco - Festival Internacional de Vídeo & Dança. She is most interested in investigating and blurring the boundaries between dance and other art forms and mediums and using this to question gender constructions and explore new corporeities.

Melissa Smith, offering the science and art of rest, explores a more sustainable way to develop practices of rest, movement, and overall wellness. A Yoga Alliance ERYT® 500  educator in Restorative and Sustainable Yoga, and International yoga retreats. She is also a candidate for licensure in December 2022 for Clinical Mental Health (LMHC) through New Mexico Highlands University. Melissa currently lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico where she operates Pranava Yoga Studio. She hosts online wellness retreats for caregivers of Alzheimer’s.

Michaela Bartoskova is a singing/voice/movement coach. In addition to running her private studio practice, she leads two vocal projects in London, such as a vocal improvisation group, and voice and yoga classes. She earned a Master’s degree with distinction in Voice Pedagogy/Research at the University of Wales/Voice Study Centre. One of her research studies was published by Routledge at the peer-reviewed journal Voice and Speech Review. She is an Associate Teacher of Fitzmaurice Voicework.

Michele Feldheim, BMC® Practitioner and Teacher, Pilates Instructor, Massage Therapist, has been having a private practice for many years, specializing in working and teaching the client not only to receive good work, and how to further help themselves afterwards. For the past 9 years Michele has specialized in working with people with chronic illness of all kinds, helping her clients to use their mind and bodies to facilitate a better life for themselves, developing their skills for self healing along the way.

Miranda Zapata was born and raised in San Juan, Texas. She is a movement artist and educator who holds a BFA in Dance from Sam Houston State University. Zapata recently received her MFA in Dance and Certification in Multicultural Women’s and Gender Studies at Texas Woman’s University in 2022. Her work focuses on building solidarity and awareness toward social justice for marginalized communities; she draws on personal and collective experiences and current social-political issues. Zapata’s research entails a framework grounded in feminist theory. In continuing her scholarly research on embodied storytelling, Zapata believes that as an artist and activist, it is her moral obligation to amplify and uplift voices of color.

Nefertiti Charlene Altan is a queer mayan-black latina transdisciplinary movement artist, educator, curator, activist creating contemporary and folk work internationally for more than a decade. She has developed works and somatic-based methodologies at the intersection of body, movement, sound, rhythm, memory, place, ritual, decoloniality & feminism, collaborating with artists from the Americas, Africa, Europe interested in embodied ancestral communication across space and time for cross-generational reconciliation, liberation, innovation. She has begun pursuing the MFA in dance at St Mary's college, California where somatics is a central component led by Rosana Baragan, an MBCA member that shares methodologies from Bonnie Brainbridge Cohen, Martina Kotanabe, Sondra Fraleigh among others.

Remo Rostagno, born in 1953, is an Italian dancer and choreographer, Body-Mind Centering® Practitioner and Craniosacral Biodynamics Therapist. In his seminars he offers and shares a deep rooted knowledge of the interior microcosmos and of the relationship between internal images and metaphors and the expression of movement and dance in the space. His great passion is for all the different stages of human development, from the moment of conception (and even before), through the embryonic and fetal development, till adult life and the last moment of transformation that we call death. After 30 years spent in Germany he is now back to Italy, where he founded in 2018 the association In Flow Biodinamica Torino: interest in movement, yoga, nature and teaching.

Samantha Tamoki Matsumoto is a Japanese American dancer and choreographer for screendance and stage. Samantha is an MFA in Dance - Creative Practice candidate at Saint Mary’s College of California with a somatics focus. She has had the opportunity to participate in seminars with Rosana Barragan, Elizabeth Randall Rains, Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, Martha Eddy, and Sondra Fraleigh. Her current research examines how memories are carried from ancestors before through the cells of the body that have influenced her movement aesthetic and choreography. Her research is inspired by her family and the Japanese community affected by the Japanese Internment Camps of World War II. Samantha’s work shares stories of human relationships and explores her own lived experiences through movement.

Shay Hartung holds a Master of Fine Arts in Performance and Choreography from Sam Houston University and has served as a Lecturer of Dance at Texas State University since 2008. In collaboration with the Erick Hawkins Dance Foundation, she works to maintain the Hawkins’ archives as a founding member of Hawkins West Institute. Shay is the Artistic Director of Shay Ishii Dance Company and Dancestry, a collaborative project that celebrates artistic heritage and revives historic modern dance. She has performed and choreographed for both companies nationally and internationally. Throughout her career, somatic studies have been the essential foundation of her teaching, artistic and research practices.

Snježana Premuš graduated from LCDS London/1998. Her curious, questioning mind led her to various international choreographic and improvisation projects through Europe, where she gained invaluable experience in understanding the body, poetic image, practices and developed her own approach to comical, fantastical or metaphysical imagery. In 2012, she studied somatics at Moveus Berlin and obtained a certificate in EAY. Since then, the somatic approach to movement has deeply marked her artistic development. She has been unfolding somatic and dance research work in the project Physical Manifestations, in which attunement is practised by spectators and artists. She establishes intriguing environments not only for re-sensitizing the body but also questioning how to be together. 

Susan Bauer, MFA, RSME/T, RSDE is a dance/somatic educator, founder of Embodiment in Education™, and author of The Embodied Teen. A Fulbright Scholar, she has taught for 30+ years in the U.S and Asia, informed by her extensive background in dance, Authentic Movement, and Body-Mind Centering®, and offers teacher certification trainings and workshops internationally. Susan’s passionate vision of a more holistic model of education—inclusive of movement and body-mind awareness—fuels her quest to support the well-being of adults and youth alike in these challenging times. She offers groups in Authentic Movement and has a private practice as a somatic movement therapist, integrating somatics, Authentic Movement, and meditation as a basis for conscious personal transformation. www.susanbauer.com

Vanessa Chapple is a performing arts director, artist and educator who works across the disciplines of theatre, dance, voice, sound-art and music Her creative works range from solo theatre for intimate settings inspired by personal story, to large scale community performance projects which provide opportunities for participation in the making and performance of live music and theatre and dance. She is currently a PhD student at RMIT Melbourne as well as a student in the Body-Mind Centering® Somatic Movement Educator program at Somatic Education Australasia.