Franchesska Berry
Franchesska Berry is an eloquent performer, choreographer, and international intercultural arts educator. Franchesska specializes in dances and traditional culture of West Africa and the African Diaspora; however, her expertise is not limited to African based forms. Franchesska’s unique dance style is informed by her comprehensive background in the western classical forms of ballet, modern, jazz and improvisational dance. Franchesska strives to integrate dance modalities as if dance were derived from a single root language and her styled modalities were innovative dialects.
Franchesska developed her professorial expertise as an academic leader in international intercultural arts education, termed the Relational Model of Education. Her pedagogical approach is firmly rooted in the lineage and kinesthetic anthropology of African and African American dance and cultural history. Ms. Berry invites students into a process of a liberated understanding of African thought and history, anchored in West African cultures. Her dance-informed integrative work helps students and audiences reclaim what has been forgotten and distorted by design, and denied through colonial cancellation.
Artist Support Program 2004 (with Som La Bi Joli Dance & Drum): Record visiting West African musicians, enabling the company to more easily rehearse and perform.
