Peeling Oranges

Vanessa Goodman respectfully acknowledges that she lives, works, and creates on the stolen ancestral and unceded territories of the Coast Salish peoples, including the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Stó:lō, Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh), and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations. She holds a BFA from Simon Fraser University and is the artistic director of Action at a Distance Dance Society. Vanessa is drawn to art that carries weight and meaning beyond the purely aesthetic, using her choreography as a medium to explore the human condition. Her choreographic practice weaves generative movement and sonic systems into performative environments, creating a sense of intimacy between the body and its surroundings.

Vanessa spent a decade collaborating with Caroline Shaw on their work Graveyards and Gardens which has deeply informed her creative practice. Her early training includes studies with Laurie Raymond, Gabby Kamino, and CCDT. As a performer, she has collaborated with a wide range of contemporary artists and companies, including Judith Garay, Evann Siebens, Justine A. Chambers, Julia Sasso, plastic orchid factory, Company CI and Mascall Dance, among others.

She has received several awards and honors, including the Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award (2013), the Yulanda M. Faris Scholarship (2017/18), the Chrystal Dance Prize (2019/20 & 2024/25), the Schultz Endowment from the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity (2019), the "Space to Fail" program (2019/20), and the Isadora Award (2025).

Vanessa's work has been presented in locally by various organizations, including PuSH Performing Arts Festival, The Vancouver Art Gallery, DanceHouse, SFU Woodwards, Music on Main, The Firehall Arts Centre, The Dance Centre, The Chutzpah! Festival, and The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts. She has also presented her work further afield in places such as Port Alice (Vancouver Island), Sointula (Malcolm Island), Powell River, Nanaimo (Crimson Coast), Langley Fine Arts, Salt Spring Island (Arts Spring), Kelowna (The Living Things Festival), Calgary (Fluid Festival), Edmonton (Brian Webb Dance Company), Quebec City (La Rotonde), Montreal (The Mai, CINARS official programming), Halifax (Kinetic Studio), Toronto (SummerWorks, Dance Made in Canada Festival), Seattle (On the Boards, Seattle Symphony), Portland (Risk/Reward Festival, Third Angle), Brooklyn (Offset Dance Fest), New York (Estrogenius Festival), Bucharest (Switch Lab), Budapest (L1 Festival), Boston (Celebrity Series), Lisbon (BioFriction/ FACTT), Zagreb (Moving Balkans), Novi Sad (SKCNS), North Macedonia (Museum of Contemporary Art), Albania (National Experimental Theatre "Black Box Hall"), Slovenia (Španski Borci Main Hall), Rijeka (Port of Dance Festival), Italy (Teatro delle Passioni Moderna, Spellbound Orbita), Austria (Architekturhaus Klagenfurt, Burghof Klagenfurt), Romania (Stere Popescu Hall, CNDB), Germany (Fabrik Potsdam, Tanz Bremen, Tanzmesse 22/24), Sweden (Vitlycke Centre for the Performing Arts), Bulgaria (Antistatic International Festival for Contemporary Dance and Performance), Mexico City (International Contemporary Dance Festival FIDCDMX), and Brazil (Bienal Internacional de Dança Do Ceará).

Vanessa has been an artist-in-residence at la Briqueterie CDCN (France), Om Choreographic Research Centre (Romania), Cutivamos Cultura/BioFriction (Portugal), The Dance Centre, Dance Victoria, Harbourfront Centre, The Shadbolt Centre, and The Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, where she was also on faculty. She presented work and facilitated at Trinity Laban's 2020 Co-Lab Project in London. Commissions include Ballet BC 44 (2024 & 2025), Ballet BC Annex Company, Springboard Dansé Montréal, Alexis Fletcher, Votive Dance, Lamon Dance, Modus Operandi, and the SFU rep class.

This season, Vanessa is collaborating with artists Scott Morgan (Loscil) and Simona Deaconescu (Romania). For more information, visit www.actionatadistance.ca.

Natasha Dennison (She/They) is an emerging multidisciplinary dance artist, choreographer, costume designer, and visual artist. Born in White Rock, BC, on the unceded homelands of the Semiahmoo First Nation and the broader territory of the Coast Salish Peoples, she was later raised on homelands of the Algonquin, Kinakwii First Nations, known as North Augusta, Ontario. She studied Contemporary Dance at Simon Fraser University School for Contemporary Arts and graduated in 2023.

Natasha places her energy towards the exploration of minute eccentricities within sound, movement, emotional complexity and subtlety within the context of dance. She strives to create work that is atmospheric, rich with gestural tendency, texture, and honesty. Often touching on themes of camp, catharsis, oceanography and plant biology, memory, and self identity, themes of her work span a wide variety of investigations and celebrations. She is continuously inspired by colour, storytelling, and fashion, which often weave into her work and fuel inspiration. Natasha has felt so grateful to work with the SFU Dance students, and is excited to debut this piece.

David Lee Parker is a native of Long Island, New York. He started his dance training at Long Island High School for the Arts and continued his studies at Mason Gross School of the Arts, where he graduated in the class of 2018 with honors and received his B.F.A. in dance performance. David has trained at the Alvin Ailey Summer Intensive, American Ballet Theater Summer Collegiate Program, Gibney Summer Contemporary Dance Program, and has had the privilege to study abroad for a year in Israel at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. David was an apprentice for EVIDENCE Dance Company, and has danced for Brian Brooks Moving Company, Visual Artist Carrie Mae Weems, Kyle Marshall, Kinesis Project Dance Theater, the Metropolitan Opera, and the award-winning immersive show Sleep No More NYC. 

As a new choreographer, his goal is to simply create work that tells stories that we can all relate to in some way. 

He feels honored to be sharing his first choreographic work since university. This work would not have been possible without the amazing collaboration with the students in this work, and the gracious support of his dear wife, Valerie. 

Soli Deo Gloria