Chelsea Gregory is a community-engaged dance theater artist, writer, educator and cultural organizer originally from Atlanta, GA. She was recently part of the touring cast of Cornerstone Theater Company’s “California: The Tempest”, a community-engaged adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Tempest” that addressed issues such as food equity, immigration reform, climate change and the prison industry. Other recent performances include “Mapa Corpo” with Guillermo Goméz-Peña, a workshop performance of Andrea Thome’s “Necklace of the Dove,” and a performance piece called “Body Stories” based on research by somatic psychologists on how oppression impacts the body. Recent choreography projects include Working Theater’s “Bamboo in Brooklyn” by Ed Cardona, and PopUP Theatrics’ site-specific immersive “Broken City: Harlem” written by Sandra Daley Sharif and Peca Stefan. She also developed and directed a street theater initiative for the Berkeley VS Big Soda campaign, which led to the first successful soda tax measure in the US. She was a contributing writer for Oregon Shakespeare and One Minute Play Festival’s “Every 28 Hours,” a community-engaged theater project addressing the impact of police violence on Ferguson, MO. She is currently serving as a member of the Cultural Competency Team for Every 28 Hours, supporting host communities to ensure that the project is produced with integrity and accountability to those most impacted by these issues.
Her original work has been presented at venues such as The Culture Project, LaMama ETC, Nuyorican Poet’s Cafe, The Living Theater, Bronx Academy of Arts & Dance and Brooklyn Arts Exchange in New York City; LA Women’s Theater Festival in Los Angeles; La Pena Cultural Center in the Bay Area; and 7 Stages in Atlanta, GA. Her solo performance piece “The 6 Project” explored how cultural identity shapes our point of view, and is based on interviews conducted around the Jena 6 Case, where 6 young black men were unjustly sentenced after racial conflicts initiated by white students. 6 Project performances, workshops & dialogues took place in 12 US cities, engaging over 2000 people in the work of racial healing. From 2005-2008, she was part of the touring cast of Eve Ensler and Jane Fonda’s co-production “We Got Issues!” and worked as a choreographer for Cornerstone Theater Company’s Summer Institute, Yadira De La Riva‘s “One Journey” and several other theatrical productions. Directing credits include Dance Me Free, play devised with Bristol Riverside Theater’s Teen Company exploring the transformative power of dance, “Future Academy” for Queens Theater in the Park’s youth theater festival, and Girls for Gender Equity’s “Yo Shorty”, a performance piece about young women’s safety in public schools.
Ms. Gregory’s poetry is published in anthologies such as The Charis Review, Steve Cannon’s “Gathering of the Tribes” and “We Got Issues: A Young Woman’s Guide to a Bold, Courageous and Empowered Life.” She also contributed a chapter to Jlove Calderon’s book “Occupying Privilege”, discussing theater as a vehicle for racial justice and healing. As a dancer she has performed with Movement for the Urban Village, ASE Dance Theatre Collective, Beacon Dance Company and Ned Williams Dunham Dance Company, and studied with The Limón Institute, Urban Bush Women, the Boston Ballet, Ron K. Brown and Baba Richard Gonzales. She received her B.A. in “Community Empowerment and Creative Culture” from New York University, and her M.F.A. in “Theatre and Contemporary Performance” from Naropa University.
With Poetic Theater Productions:
Artist in March4Word
Actress in Murder the Machine in Poetic License 2014
Choreography Consultant with THE REFUGE PROJECT in Poetic License 2016