Indigenous Performing Arts Organizations

• Aboriginal Arts, The Banff Centre
  Situated on Buffalo Mountain in Blackfoot and Stoney territories, in the heart of Banff National Park, The Banff Centre offers an inspiring setting for Aboriginal artists of all disciplines to realize their creative potential and to transform their careers. [Read More]
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• Alberta Aboriginal Arts:
  An Aboriginal theatre and performing arts organization based in Edmonton and promotes the growth of Aboriginal arts and artists in Edmonton and Alberta, through artistic and cultural expressions of music, storytelling, dance and art. [Read More]
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• Alianait Entertainment Group
  A Nunavut-based organization designed to consolidate community through the arts. The Alianait Arts Festival is a showcase of the arts, featuring music, theatre, film, storytelling, circus, dance and visual artists from Nunavut, Canada, and the world. [Read More]
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• Centre for Indigenous Theatre
  The Centre provides theatrical training informed by traditional artistic expression, teaching and values, while creating an environment that encourages cultural exchange of practices and techniques between Nations and communities. [Read More]
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• Chocolate Woman Collective
  An ad hoc group of senior Aboriginal artists, artist/scholars and their collaborators formed in 2007 to research and create the theatrical performance, Chocolate Woman Dreams the Milky Way. [Read More]
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• Compaigni V’ni Dansi
  A Vancouver-based dance group that fuses traditional Métis dance with contemporary arts. The group has been dedicated to preservation and innovation, successfully sharing the culture and history of the Métis with both Aboriginal and mainstream audiences. [Read More]
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• De-ba-jeh-mu-jig Theatre
  A professional theatre company dedicated to revitalizing the Anishinaabeg culture, language, and heritage. Located Wikwemikong Unceded Indian Reserve, Manitoulin Island Ontario. [Read More]
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• Earth in Motion World Indigenous Dance
  A collective 
founded by dancers/choreographers Alejandro Ronceria and
 Penny Couchie dedicated to presenting innovative, exciting
 and thought-provoking art. [Read More]
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• Full Circle: First Nations Performance
  This Vancouer-based Aboriginal Arts organization creates opportunities for Aboriginal artists, writers, and performers to express the reality of First Nations experiences and to work in harmony with First Nations traditions, while simultaneously engaging contemporary, interdisciplinary theatrical techniques. [Read More]
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• Gwaandak Theatre
  Based in the Yukon, the Gwaandak Theatre helps develop, premiere, and produce plays by award-winning and emerging Canadian playwrights. [Read More]
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• Kaha:wi Dance Theatre
  An artist based company founded by Artistic Director/choreographer Mohawk Santee Smith. KDT creates professional dance productions and is committed to increasing awareness and understanding of Aboriginal culture through the work of the company. [Read More]
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• Native Earth Performing Arts
  Based in Toronto, NEPA is Canada’s oldest native performing arts company. Through professional artistic creation, development, and production, NEPA is dedicated to expressing the Aboriginal experience in Canada. [Read More]
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• Ode’min Glizis Festival
  The Ode’min Giizis Festival is held during the 6th moon of the Anishnaabe calendar (June) in Peterborough, Ontario. The Festival celebrates this auspicious harvest season and traditional Anishnaabe territory with an incredible six day multi-disciplinary arts festival, featuring local and visiting artists from the four directions. [Read More]
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• Raven Spirit Dance
  A Vancouver-based dance society that is dedicated to creating, developing, and producing contemporary dance that is rooted in traditional and contemporary aboriginal worldview. By sharing this work on local, national and international stages, RSDS demonstrates the important role played by dance in cultural reclamation and expressing human experience. [Read More]
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• Red Diva Productions
  A collaboration between veteran artists Michelle St. John and Marie Clements that is committed to deepening the vocabulary and aesthetic style of integrative Indigenous performance and storytelling. [Read More]
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• Saskatchewan Native Theatre Company
  A Saskatoon-based company that is dedicated to the creation, development, production and presentation of dynamic and innovative Indigenous Performing Arts productions based on Aboriginal peoples world views and experiences. [Read More]
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• Sheatre
  A professional arts organization using collaborative creative processes and traditional artistic practices to respond to community needs and interests. Our mission is to inspire creative expression, artistic excellence, transformative learning and change through socially relevant workshops and artistic productions. [Read More]
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• Spakwes Slolem (Eagle Song Dancers)
  An Aboriginal Arts Group constituted by Squamish Nation members (BC). Spakwus Slolem presents songs and dances that honour the Nation’s ancestry, culture, and history. [Read More]

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Indigenous Performing Artists

• Reneltta Arluk
  Storyteller, actor, playwright, producer.  Arluk is presently engaged in the following projects: playwright residency with Gwaandak Theatre; with her company, Akpik Theatre, co-producing radio drama adaptation of Richard Van Camps’ short story I Count Myself Them; and performing her play TUMIT as part of Workshop West’s Canoe Festival. [Read More]
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• Keith Barker
  Métis artist from Northwestern Ontario.  A graduate of the George Brown Theatre School, he is the former Artistic Associate at Native Earth Performing Arts. He has been a company member for The Nearly World Famous Dufflebag Theatre for over nine years.  Theatre credits include King Lear (Upcoming), Tombs of a Vanishing Indian (Red Diva/Native Earth), Jesus Chrysler (Praxis/Rhubarb). [Read More]
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• Karen Pheasant
  Experienced professional performing artist, writer, and cultural programmer/adviser. Karen Pheasant is deeply engaged in researching, writing, teaching about Aboriginal performing arts. In 2010, Karen published The Promise to the Nokomis, a story based on her personal experience twenty years ago in Whitefish Bay, Northern Ontario. [Read More]
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• David Greary
  Actor, fiction writer, poet and educator. Descended from the New Zealand Maori tribe Taranaki, Greary taught the 2010 MA in Scriptwriting at the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington, NZ. He works in theatre, film, and television as a writer, director, story editor, and dramaturg. [Read More]
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• Margaret Grenier
  Experienced director, choreographer, and instructor for First Nations Northwest Coastal dance traditions. Ability to bridge cultural knowledge with current educational practices and community issues. Margaret is currently the artistic director of Dancers of Damlehamid (who are profiled above as an organization). [Read More]
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• Starr Muranko
  A contemporary and traditional dancer and choreographer based in Vancouver. Starr bridges these two forms and weaves in the traditional teachings and history of her Cree Ancestry from the Moose Cree First Nation in Northern Ontario. She is the Artistic Associate for Raven Spirit Dance (featured above) and a dancer with the Dancers of Damelahamid (featured above). [Read More]
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• PJ Prudat
  Hailing from Saskatchewan, this (proudly) half-breed actress - French, Scandinavian, Cree, Saulteaux and Métis – most recently received the Bob Couchman award for Outstanding Female Performance (2011) for her role as Yvette Wong in Gwaandak Theatre’s Cafe Daughter. [Read More]
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• Rosary Spence
  Singer/Song Writer, Rosary Spence, is an Aboriginal musician and entrepreneur with a powerhouse voice, soulful indigenous styles, and innovative spirit. Spence has a background and experience as an Educator, Social Worker, and Performing Artist. She has worked for many years in Aboriginal Fine Arts and has an extensive background facilitating workshops and presentations in schools, community centres, social agencies and related organizations. [Read More]
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• Colette Trudeau
  Self-described rock-chick, this singer-songwriter from British Columbia is determined to bring her (Metis) aboriginal heritage into mainstream music. Filled with raw energy, power and drive, this is one girl who won’t back down until she gets what she’s set out to achieve. [Read More]
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• Yvette Nolan
  Playwright, director and dramaturge. Nolan’s plays include BLADE, Job’s Wife, Video, Annie Mae’s Movement, Scattering Jake, Two Old Women, the libretto Hilda Blake, and the radio play Owen. She is the editor of Beyond the Pale: Dramatic Writing from First Nations Writers and Writers of Colour, and of the upcoming Refractions: Solo, with Donna-Michelle St Bernard. [Read More]
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• Kayrn Recollet
  Professor at Trent University and performing arts associate. Recollet co-founded the Weaverbird Collective Women’s Theatre Group, Peterborough, Ontario. She has been on the Centre for Indigenous Theatre’s board since 2009. She has also worked as assistant director, actor, and assistant presenter for various performances through Indigenous Performance Initiatives at NOZHEM: First Peoples House.  [Read More]

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Friends of the Indigenous Performing Arts Alliance

• Headlines Theatre
  A community-based professional theatre company for social change. Based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Headlines works in the area of community-based, issue-oriented theatre. [Read More]
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• Professional Association for Canadian Theatres
  A member-driven organization that serves as the collective voice of professional Canadian theatres. For the betterment of Canadian theatre, PACT provides leadership, national representation and a variety of programs and practical assistance to member companies, enabling members to do their own creative work. [Read More]
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• Theatre Ontario
  A charitable, not-for-profit association serving community, educational and professional theatre organizations and individuals through a range of Programs and Services and Resources. Theatre Ontario develops and supports theatre practitioners across the province, by providing resources, networking, training and advocacy

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