Soham Dance Space

Feeling sentimental as this is the last season of Alyssa Gregory’s bold, authentic, and community-centering project, The Process Podcast .process.podcast, that Soham Dance Space has the honor of being a part of before we sunset. In 2021, we piloted our Producing Partnership program, raised $10k from 112 donors to seed this project, secured the $10k CDF Digital Dance Grant with Alyssa, and have been absolutely inspired to work as co-producer behind the scenes in support of three dynamic seasons, each a distinctly unique format for conversations with local dancemakers about their creative processes. Led by Alyssa’s vision and producing chops, the first season brought us 9 episodes of audio convos; the second season boasted a live showing of work-in-progress and a live taping with the studio audience; and the third season - which drops THIS FRIDAY, Sep. 20th - is Alyssa’s smart stab at video podcasting over a shared meal. Every single season has been thoughtful and this next one, the most gorgeous yet.
�Subscribe to The Process Podcast Youtube & Spotify channels to catch this season - The Group Chat - which brings together a powerhouse crew of Chicago makers and movers to unpack what it really means to create within an ensemble.

Kudos to Alyssa for boldly experimenting with this project in so many beautiful ways that have thrilled the dance community again and again.

Thank you to everyone involved!

process.podcast

.greer_re .king .expt

“Come on by to say goodbye!”

3 FINAL GATHERINGS
AS SOHAM SUNSETS:

Friday, September 13, 5-8pm
Thursday, September 19, 5-8pm
Saturday, September 21, 5-8pm

At Soham Dance Space
1932 S Halsted St. #206, Chicago

🌺 Open visitation hours for your last chance to be, breathe, wiggle, hug, and reflect at Soham Dance Space. Flow in and out as you please, and spend as little or as long as you’d like.
🌺 This is a container for contemplation of life cycles, endings and beginnings, remembering, letting go, and transformation in whatever personal or Soham-specific ways these themes are on your mind.
🌺 There will be an opportunity to make paper flowers or write love notes to adorn the studio in honor of whatever your hearts are remembering.
🌺 Light refreshments served.
🌺 A gently-held 30ish-minute Closing Circle at 7:15pm may include community sentiments (if you’ve got any), words from Director Anjal Chande (if she’s got any), and a moment to breathe together before we say good night.

Accessibility: Masks required when not eating/drinking. The studio is on the 2nd floor, requiring a walk up a flight of stairs. Use of elevator is possible with advance request; please email [email protected] 24 hours before the event to secure elevator ride. BYO seat cushion or access tools to feel comfortable.

We also have a digital kudos board, where you may share your love, a photo, or what Soham has meant to you. https://www.sohamdancespace.org/soham-sunsets. Link in bio. Thank you so much for taking the time to help us celebrate Soham’s 17-year journey through your voices! 🙏🏽

Soham Dance Space is closing out its 17-year journey by hosting a Sunset Residency this summer with Aleen Olivares, Amina Dreessen, Ashwaty Chennat, Felicia Holman, Izayo Mazehualli, Keyierra Collins, Kinnari Vora, Maya Odim, Shireen Hamza, and Zachary Nicol. The ask? To be with their bodies, to be with the space, and to be with Soham in its final hours. This last Soham hurrah offers each resident a $2000 artist fee and ample chance to be, rest, play, mourn, cry, dream, tinker, incubate, and honor this current moment, whatever that means for them. As the light softens in the sky and Soham returns to the ground, we hope this ending will fertilize many new beginnings through these artists and beyond.

🩷🧡💛🩷🧡💛🩷🧡💛

(This program is a reshaped expression of Anjal Chande’s “Space Dance Temple Body Gut Gut Gut Gut”, a project which received an Arts Work Fund grant.)

🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅

ICYMI: Soham Dance Space sunsets September 30th. Please take a moment to share your love, a photo memory, or what Soham has meant to you on our Sunset Board. Thank you so much for taking the time to help us celebrate through your / the community’s voices! https://www.sohamdancespace.org/soham-sunsets. 🙏🏽

The Chattopadhyay & Sujdak Families in partnership with Soham Dance Space

Cordially invite you to the
Bharatanatyam Arangetram

of their daughters
Ishani Chattopadhyay & Sanya Sujdak

Disciples of Anjal Chande,
Artistic Director of Soham Dance Space,
& Savitha Chelladurai,
Teaching Artist

on

Saturday, July 13, 2024, 5-7PM
Seating begins at 4:30PM

The Kehrein Center For The Arts
5628 W Washington Blvd, Chicago

Accompanied by live orchestra

Light refreshments to follow

RSVP by July 1st:
www.sohamdancespace.org/arangetram-of-ishani-and-sanya

~

Arangetram literally means “ascending the stage.” It is considered a debut—the first formal performance for seasoned students to display their basic mastery of the art form through a solo recital lasting about two hours. The arangetram marks the artistic blossoming of disciples under the tutelage of their guru, and it is regarded as a culmination of their years of training.

3rd out of 3 total duet arangetram photo shoots complete for Soham Dance Space. That this July’s arangetram will be our last is sentimental to say the least (2017 with Rupa and Nikki, 2020 with Ashna and Anjali, and now 2024 with these lovelies). Soham sunsets in September. The arc of growth, culmination, change, and unknown horizons are reverberating as memories with all the students who have been a part of Soham’s classes since 2007 wash over me. Honored to do this last hurrah with Sanya and Ishani, two spirits whose love for the creative process exemplifies some of the values that seeded Soham Dance Space to begin with. Save the date for their arangetram, July 13th, because it will be a beautiful and emooooooooootional day.

Endless love to all who have been on this journey with me. 🙏🏽

-Anjal

Grateful to Lauren Warnecke for this Chicago Tribune preview that celebrates a creative process dear to my heart, one that is now culminating in perhaps the first piece of art I’ve ever made that truly feels like me. Twisted shape-making and introspection atop a bright yellow chair says it all.

🧡💛🥕🍑🌋🍊🍉🧡💛

THE NEXT CUP OF TEA

Performed by Anjal Chande
with Sharon Udoh on piano.


MARCH 8, 9, 14, 15, 16, 8pm.

At Steppenwolf’s 1700 Theater
1700 N Halsted St. Chicago

Co-presented by Steppenwolf’s LookOut Series & the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago

Tickets $11, $22, $33.
Sliding scale; pay what reflects your financial means at this time.

Accessibility:
Closed Captions on Friday 3/15. American Sign Language interpretation and Audio Description on Saturday 3/16.

The Next Cup of Tea is a solo dance-theater performance by Anjal Chande that investigates how to make sense of the never-ending impulses that run through our hearts, our everyday moments, and our contradictory experiences. Through improvisational dance and storytelling, Chande reflects on wealth, her grandfather, the politics of art, and more. Zigzagging between the gnawing inner world and daily physical routine, The Next Cup of Tea traverses the ordinary, unsettling, and enchanting.

🔗 https://www.steppenwolf.org/tickets--events/lookout/24-spring/the-next-cup-of-tea/

Happy new year! And happy last year of Soham Dance Space!

With deep gratitude to our community and a swelling of nostalgia for the journey this has been, I am announcing that Soham Dance Space will be sunsetting on September 30, 2024. Moving through our 17th and final year, the following public programs will be happening, and we hope to see you there!

- 5 performances of The Next Cup of Tea by Anjal Chande with pianist Sharon Udoh - March 8th, 9th, 14th, 15th, 16th.

- The arangetram culmination recital of students Ishani Chattopadhyay and Sanya Sujdak on July 13th.

- Another volume of The Process Podcast with Alyssa Gregory. Details to come.

- A series of studio activations called Space Dance Temple Body Gut Gut Gut Gut. Details to come.

To celebrate and commemorate Soham Dance Space, we invite you to share what Soham has meant to you on this kudos board (https://www.sohamdancespace.org/soham-sunsets), through words, images, or video, at any point in the coming year. At this sunset hour, your reflections online and in-person will paint the sky shades of orange and pink. 🙂

Thank you so much for being a part of this work and community! I am looking forward to sharing more of my reflections across meaningful gatherings with you during this final year. Stay tuned!

With love, inspiration, and a reverence for life cycles,

Anjal

We are excited to share the thoughtful reflections of Felicia Holman who captured the joy-filled swirl of ideas that came out of Soham Dance Space's Circle Summit, the closing salon for our Artist-in-Residence Program. As a circle wielder herself, Felicia joined Tiff Beatty, Parijat Desai, Amani Girafa, Ayako Kato, Maya Odim, and Diana Quiñones Rivera, for a wide-ranging, fascinating, and philosophical conversation about the power of circles as artistic and communal structures.

Enjoy the full synthesis up on the Soham Dance Space website (link in bio). Special thanks to .odim for their participation and inspiration!

Interdisciplinary artist, cultural facilitator, programmer, and writer, Felicia Holman grounds her work in critical thought, intersectionality, community building, and embodied storytelling. Recent projects and awards include: PRJ 2.0 Podcast host, Threewalls RadLow Fellowship, Re:Place residency, L’Louise Foundation Career Growth Fund Award, and co-founder of the BIPOC Emerging Residency Leadership collective. Both as a co-founder of Honey Pot Performance and as an independent artist, Holman has performed in Chicago, nationally, and internationally. Her writing has appeared in Performance Response Journal, The Quarantine Times, See Chicago Dance, among others. Lifelong Chicagoan and Prince “fam,” Holman sums up her dynamic artrepreneurial life in 3 words—‘Creator, Connector, Conduit'.

We are sooo excited to share the following special illustrations with you! Comic artist and illustrator Shebani Rao attended Soham Dance Space's AiR Transform | Affirm Kick-Off Convening on Zoom and created an artistic response to the affirming insights shared by Anjal Chande, Parijat Desai, Dr. Meiver De la Cruz, Nadia Khayrallah, Meena Murugesan, and Bhumi B. Patel. Enjoy the wit, humor, and provocative imaginations captured by Shebani’s visual interpretations of an inspiring conversation! Special thanks to .

The complete collection of visual responses are on our website (link in bio).  

Shebani Rao (she/her) is a Philly-based comic artist, illustrator, and researcher. Her work has been featured in LitHub, The Margins, Buzzfeed India, Tides, and others. She enjoys interdisciplinary artistic projects of all kinds. She also collaborates with various nonprofits and works for Philadelphia City government by day. You can check out her daily musings on Instagram: .

As an apt closing circle of Soham's culminating AiR programs, Soham held an interdisciplinary Circle Summit this week with Artistic Director Anjal Chande, Soham AiR resident artist Parijat Desai , and Chicago-based artists Tiff Beatty , Amani Girafa , Ayako Kato , Maya Odim .odim, and Diana Quiñones Rivera . They came together to discuss the power of circles as artistic and communal structures, in their own creative practices and as they’ve observed in the world around. Through the fascinating and philosophical conversation, the possibilities for social change through circular gathering was deeply felt. The format for this final AiR convening was inspired by the Artists' Sessions at Studio 35 (1950) published by Julia Klein of Chicago's Soberscove Press. Felicia Holman , a circle-wielding artist herself, joined the Summit as its synthesist. Look for her written response on Soham's blog next month!

More info and artist bios on our website:
www.sohamdancespace.org/artist-in-residence

Dream Team alert! Going into our last week of the Artist-in-Residence programs, we want to shout out the incredible team of co-producers who made this magic 18-month-long process happen: Anjal Chande, Joyy Norris, and Roell Schmidt! 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽

Soham could not have piloted this program in such an ambitious and thoughtful way without the energy, earnestness, and experience of these co-producers who shaped and executed a beautiful vision. Cheers to our team!

Come say hello and hang out with us this weekend. The team will be at both events!

Sat. 9/17, 5:30pm
Washington Park
5531 S King Dr
(next to the field house on the park’s west side)

Sun. 9/18, 5:30pm
Julia de Burgos Park
1805 N Albany
(on the 606)

More info: www.sohamdancespace.org/artist-in-residence