Native Earth Performing Arts will current Syreeta Hector’s piece Black Ballerina from Could 23-25, 2025 at Aki Studio. The work relies on Hector’s personal experiences on this planet of classical ballet as somebody who’s each Black and Indigenous, and explores problems with id and becoming in.
“Black Ballerina could be for anybody that has struggled to suit into society or a specific neighborhood,” mentioned Syreeta Hector in an announcement. “It’s not nearly race, additionally it is about reimagining what we will do for the sustainability of dance efficiency in our future.”
Black Ballerina is Half 2 of Native Earth’s Niimi’iwe Dance Collection, which started with What We Carry by Barbara Kaneratonni Diabo in February 2025.
Syreeta Hector
Dance artist and educator Syreeta Hector is an Assistant Professor in Dance at York College. As a performer, she has labored with outstanding firms comparable to Adelheid Dance Tasks, Danny Grossman Dance Firm, Peggy Baker Dance Tasks, Citadel + Compagnie, and Toronto Dance Theatre. She earned as Masters degre in Dance Research from York College, and is a graduate of The Nationwide Ballet College’s Instructor Coaching Program and The College of Toronto Dance Theatre.
A Mi’kmaq, African-Canadian and French Acadian, she relies in Toronto, Ontario. Syreeta is at present engaged on a second chapter within the Black Ballerina sequence, and up to date commissions embody ensemble works for Mocean Dance (Nova Scotia) and ProArteDanza (Ontario), and a brand new work for Kittiwake Dance Theatre (Newfoundland).
Syreeta Hector’s Black Ballerina: The recording of this efficiency was showcased on the Constructing an IBPOC Touring Community: A Convention, Could 29-30, 2023 on the Citadel + Compagnie (Toronto, ON, Canada)
Black Ballerina
Black Ballerina started as a brief work, and has taken the stage in numerous shorter variations since 2017. Hector has been performing the progressively evolving piece on the SummerWorks Pageant, and in a digital model throughout the pandemic in Stratford, the place she received the Stratford Pageant Lab Award for Analysis and Creation in 2019. Hector and Black Ballerina additionally garnered a Dora Mavor Moore Award nomination in 2020.
It’s been carried out for dwell in Halifax, St. John’s, and Winnipeg, and Hector launched a metropolis tour in Calgary in February 2025. Music for the efficiency contains Nick Baker’s Bizarre Creatures, Marie Davidson, Richard Reed Parry, A Tribe Referred to as Crimson, and Kendrick Lamar.
“In previous seasons, we offered Niimi’iwe as a double-bill night of dance. This season, we selected to broaden the choices to every maintain their very own house in our season, and in order that we will honour the person tales that each include,” mentioned Joelle Peters, Creative Director of Native Earth.
“Each bit works by itself, however in connecting them in our Niimi’iwe Collection, we’re inviting audiences to discover the nuances of Indigenous id tales and highlighting the significance of self-expression in dance.”
Native Earth Performing Arts is Canada’s oldest skilled Indigenous theatre firm, and is at present in its forty second yr devoted to creating, growing and producing skilled creative expressions of the Indigenous expertise in Canada.
- Black Ballerina takes the stage Could 23, 24 and 24 at Aki Studio. Discover extra particulars and tickets (costs on a sliding scale) [HERE].
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Anya Wassenberg is a Toronto Metropolis Editor at Ludwig Van. She is an skilled freelance author, blogger and writing teacher.