Join the artists of CONTRA-TIEMPO, a multilingual Los Angeles-based activist dance theater company, for two days of vibrant on-campus activities. Get to know the artists and awaken your power as an agent for social change; bring your noise-makers in a procession to Harvard Dance Center; witness an excerpt of original dance performed by the artists; be guided through Afro-Latin social dance forms rooted in radical joy, and learn ancestral technologies as tools for resilience. For all abilities and levels of experience. No prior dance knowledge required!   

REGISTER HERE FOR ALL EVENTS WITH CONTRA-TIEMPO!
 

Presented by the OFA Dance Program in partnership with The Harvard Foundation and EMR 177: Cuir/ Queer Latinidades: Film, Theatre, and Performance in the Americas.

Student group partners: Candela Latin Dance Troupe, Harvard Caribbean Club, and the Harvard Undergraduate Dominican Student Association. 

See below for the full itinerary of events:

Friday, October 17:

1:30-3pm: Community conversation at Gray’s Hall in Harvard Yard (for Harvard undergraduates only)

4:30pm: Procession to Harvard Dance Center from Harvard Yard (Gray's Hall)

5-6:30pm: Artist presentation & Community Sabor Session at Harvard Dance Center 

Saturday, October 18:

2:30-4pm: Ancestral Technologies workshop at Harvard Dance Center

4:30-5:30pm: Rueda de Casino workshop at Harvard Dance Center  

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Ruby Morales

Company Member + Resource Director

(she/her) 

Ruby Morales is committed to equity, facilitating life-affirming spaces, and cultivating community relationships rooted in reciprocity, trust, and love through life and her artmaking.  She’s a dance artivist investigating culturally informed teaching methods, circular leadership models, and her relationship with movement as a bgirl and Mexican style cumbia. After receiving a BFA from Arizona State University she began touring with CONTRA-TIEMPO Activist Dance Theater and Tucson, AZ based choreographer Yvonne Montoya. She recently toured with internationally renowned creative Liz Lerman performing Wicked Bodies. In partnership with the city of Tempe (AZ), she also toured her own evening length show, Breaking Pachanga. She’s CONTRA-TIEMPO’s Resource Director and co-founder of The Pachanga Collective. In recognition of her leadership Ruby is the inaugural recipient of The Association of Performing Arts Professional’s Spark for Change award (national) and the 2023 Performing Artist Mayor’s Arts award (AZ). She continues to learn and lead as a previous B.A.C. Fellowship Mentor, a 2021 National Association of Latino Arts and Culture (NALAC) Advocacy Leadership Fellow, a 2021 Intercultural Leadership Institute Fellow, 2023 NALAC Leadership Institute Fellow, and 2023 Critical Response Process Certification Program participant. Ruby has been awarded a Research and Development and Professional Development Grant from the AZ Commission on the Arts, The Artist Forward Fund from Artlink, multiple Phoenix Project Support Grant, The Phoenix Artist to Work Grant, and others.  

IG: rubezyo

Jannet Galdamez

Company member + Rehearsal & Programming Director

(she/her)

Jannet Galdamez is a dance artist born, raised, and based in Los Angeles, CA. Her love for dance and music began at a very young age through social, street, family settings. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Dance and minor in Education from the University of California Irvine June of 2012 training intensively in jazz, improvisation, modern and ballet. She has been studying Salsa and Afro-Cuban dance, music, and culture for over a decade and a half and she continues to dive deep in her studies of various dance forms inside the Latin and African Diaspora along with a consistent drumming, song and vocal practice. 

Jannet has danced with Paula Abdul, Spanish Rock Band Mana, Prince Royce, Keaira LaShea's Dance Fitness Series, Maite Perroni, El Dasa, Luis Coronel, Chiquis Rivera, Ozomatli, La Sonora Santanera from Mexico City, Los Angeles based Cuban Roots Band Changui Majadero, Chicano Band Las Cafeteras, and the 2017 ON YOUR FEET Broadway Musical Promo Cast. As she continues to perform, tour, and deepen in her practice... teaching and engaging with youth and community of all ages has been a huge part of her journey. Throughout her career she has led group fitness/wellness dance classes, taught musical theatre dance for many years through PAW (an award winning summer camp and after school performing arts program working with youth between 4 to 14 years old through this program), volunteered and worked closely as a teaching artist and behind the scenes with The Floor Improv Night and The Open Floor Society (a 501 (c) non profit organization connecting the youth with a community of professional artists, engaging in multi-cultural dance and music, using improvisation to build confidence and self empowerment).

Jannet is currently the rehearsal and programming director + teaching and dance artivist with CONTRA-TIEMPO Activist Dance Theater while simultaneously dancing with Kimbambula Cuban Dance Ensemble (an ensemble and program dedicated to educating, empowering, healing through the afro-cuban dance diaspora) directed by Cuban Master Kati Hernadez, touring with Spanish Guitarist, Roni Benise’s Emmy Award Winning World Music and Dance Spectacular, and also forms part of a focused cohort with Embodiology, led by Dr. S. Ama Wray, a methodology and practice that originates from ancestral West African principles of human communication and performance practices where movement, language, and music combine.  

IG: @jgsoulbird

Accessibility:
Harvard Dance Center and Gray's Hall are accessible for wheelchair and mobility device users. If you have questions about the accessibility of the space or need to request accommodations, please contact dance@fas.harvard.edu or 617-496-0314.