Composer: Katie-James Rushin
Illustrator: Emmy Castellani
Costume Designer: David Quinn
Lighting Designer: S.C. Lucier
Administrator: Paulina Meneses
Performers: Jay Beardsley, Piper Makenzie Dye, Paige Barnett Kulbeth, Pilar Mellon-Reyes, Kate Antoinette Reyes, Dalton Young
“Suzzanne Ponomarenko’s . . . Tapestries bring[s] technical rigor and dramatic flair to queered folk tales; the choreographer is at their best in rare moments of subtlety, and the dancers rise to her challenges with alacrity.” —The Dance Enthusiast
Tapestries is an evening-length dance theatre piece told through the curious narrative of the Unicorn Tapestries (1495–1505) and a queer reimagining of Ukrainian folklore. It consists of eight vignettes, each representing a different tapestry and folklore, threaded together to tell the tale of the Magical Unicorn. This hour-length performance unfolds through rigorous and quirky dance vocabulary abstracted from Ukrainian folk dance, ballet, post-modernism, and modern dance, alongside projections of newly imagined tapestries illustrated in a surrealist, dreamlike form by Emmy Castellani, a meticulously crafted, eclectic score by Katie-James Rushin, and costumed by visionary designer David Quinn. Tapestries serves as an embodied archive of the LGBTQIA+ people; an ever-evolving abstract multi-disciplinary Сморгасбург (Smorgasbord) of queer Ukrainian culture and history. This piece was developed in part during a Baryshnikov Arts Residency.
All details subject to change.
Suzzanne Ponomarenko (Director/Choreographer) is a choreographer, performer, and dance educator based in Queens, NYC. They established Suzzanne Ponomarenko Dance in 2017 as a landing point for creating, producing, and performing dance works grounded in classical techniques intertwined with inventive, idiosyncratic, and rigorous movement alongside a thoughtful queer-centric studio practice. They completed their BFA in Dance from Marymount Manhattan College and attended Naropa University for Transpersonal Psychology. They have most notably performed with Richard Move, Yvonne Rainer, Buglisi Dance Theatre, The Stanley Love Performance Group, and have served as rehearsal director for touring company, Catapult Entertainment. They are a part of Pioneer Go East Collective’s Mentorship Cohort (2025-26), were a 2025 Residency Artist at Baryshnikov Arts Center, and serve on the selection committees of The NY Bessie’s Dance and Performance Awards and The Clive Barnes Foundation.
Photo by Deborah Lopez.