Living Gallery: Jana Lynne (JL) Caldetera Umipig

Excerpt from “Altar: Re-memberings of a Colonized Child”

Written and Conceptualized by Jana Lynne (JL) Umipig
Performed by SAMMAY
Choreographer: Afaliah Tribune
Music: Blessing Ritual by Shant

“Altar: The Raising of a Colonized Child” is a multi-media play that pays homage to the relearning of spiritual practice by women, who were born in the US and have ancestral backgrounds that make them indigenous to another land territory. The play uplifts stories of people who have upheld spiritual practices crucial to survival in the face of oppression and the cultural erasure of migrant peoples and tells these truths through the raising of a child by her grandmother. This excerpt speaks to the relation of the young womxn to her grandmother through the body and the notion that our ancestors live in every part of our physical selves. The body in this case is an Altar that carries remnants, fragments of ancestral being and that are honored here, by honoring the memories of exchange between the young womxn and her grandmother.

About Jana Lynne (JL) Caldetera Umipig

Daughter of Rosemarie Caldetera Umipig (Pagudpud, Ilokos Norte) and Godofredo Peralta Umipig (Santa Maria, Ilokos Sur) born and raised on the Kingdom of Hawaii. Her current and closest relation to land is the Lenape Territory (Bronx, NY). Cultural/knowledge bearer as named by her elders and does so through her multidisciplinary artistic creation work. She also has been doing direct service organizing work all over the US and Internationally in detention centers, rehabilitation centers, community centers, and the homes of those in need, for over 13 years, and has worked with primarily Youth and Intergenerational communities. She is a humble co-creator of the Sacred Circles of Survival Arts- facilitating Kali, Center for Babaylan Studies as the Educational Coordinator and founder of CfBS Decolonization School and Raised Pinay. JL received her degrees at The Claire Trevor School of the Arts at UCIrvine in Theatre and Ethnic Studies, and Steinhardt at NYU in Educational Theatre for Social Justice and Communities. She also studied at the Accamedia Dell’arte in Arrezo Italy. JL is an Inner Dance facilitator, certified Level 2 Reiki Practitioner, Core Power C2 Yoga certified, and Death Doula Certification to be completed in March 2021.

About SAMMAY

SAMMAY (she/they/siya) is the daughter of Yolanda Peñaflor Dizon; granddaughter of Salvacion Orencillo Peñaflor and Carolina Agdeppa Dizon. Born from a collective dream where the ancestors danced, drummed, and sang around ceremonial fire in the mountain tops of the arkipelago – she is a choreographer, interdisciplinary artist, and cultural producer of Bikol, Kapampangan, and Ilokano descent who bridges the traditional and contemporary in centering embodied storytelling as a vehicle for collective healing and liberation. Through multimedia dance theatre, she invokes rituals for remembering and decolonizing – creating to honor the tapestry of indigenous epistemologies embedded in our urban landscapes. Raised on Tongva Land/LA County and a settler on Yelamu/San Francisco, her practice is rooted in the fundamental knowing that dance is the medium that connects the earth and ancestral realm – the passageway to transmute intergenerational trauma across cultural lines and geographical borders. SAMMAY is the Founding Artistic Director of intercultural multidisciplinary arts festival URBAN x INDIGENOUS and Core Member of acclaimed street dance theatre company Embodiment Project. She has been featured by Dance Mission Theater, CounterPulse, Kearny Street Workshop among others and was the first-ever Featured Artist for the United States of Asia America Festival 2018. To follow their journey through the diaspora: www.sammaydizon.com.

Living Gallery, curated by Eva Yaa Asantewaa and normally produced in the Gibney Gallery, presents live performance of storytelling, monologues, spoken word, stand-up, or creative talks. Each performance – free and open to the public – runs 30-45 minutes, traditionally scheduled within the hour before a dance concert presented in Gibney’s Theater. Due to COVID-19, Living Galleries for the fall season will happen on Zoom.

All Winter & Spring 2021 Season events will be held online via Zoom. Gibney’s Box Office can be reached via email. For ticketing inquiries or requests, please email Marketing & Audience Services Manager, Kimiko Tanabe, at boxoffice@gibneydance.org.

Gibney encourages people with disabilities to attend online offerings, and we welcome the opportunity to make this event more accessible. This event features automated live captioning. If you have any questions or access needs, please email us at constanza@gibneydance.org or call us at 212-677-8560 (voice only) at least 24 hours in advance of the event you plan to attend.

Left photo of Jana Lynne (JL) Umipig by Benjamin Oscar.
Right photo of SAMMAY courtesy of the artist.