Lauren Ashlee Messina
http://www.LaurenAshleeDance.comLauren Ashlee Messina is a mover, maker, and mentor, fascinated by the medium of dance. Messina holds a Master of Fine Arts in Dance degree from Belhaven University and additional dance training from the Ailey School Professional Division of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, where she received the Oprah Winfrey Foundation Scholarship Award. Messina has further developed her performance and choreographic artistry in the Greater New Orleans area in collaboration with the Marigny Opera Ballet, KM Dance Project, the New Orleans Opera, and ELLEvate Dance Company. Her choreography has been performed at the New York Jazz Choreography Project, the 92nd Street Y, the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, and the Mississippi Museum of Art. Messina is a participant in the pilot program Moving Toward Justice Open Workshop at Gibney Dance.
Lauren Ashlee Messina, CAC artist-in-residence
Photo by Lydia Mathis
For her 2022 CAC Residency, Messina will create a new dance work exploring themes of difference, devastation, and displacement. This untitled work-in-process weaves stories, performing space and time through dance, film, and spoken word, influenced by topical blues music written by Black artists in response to the great flood of the lower Mississippi River in 1927.
For the project she will collaborate with photographer and film artist André Messina (IG: @andremessina_)
Louisiana Flood Stories: 1927
