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Chris Ferris & Dancers

Company Biographies

photo: Matthew Murphy

photo: Eric Bandiero

Julia Asher, dancer

Warren Kloner, artist

Warren Kloner, is a painter and sculptor who has lived in New York for many years.  He holds a BFA in sculpture from S.U.N.Y. at Purchase and a Masters Degree in Industrial Design from Pratt Institute.  Over the years he has shown his work in many group shows in such galleries as Jack Tilton and Paula Cooper, as well as having several solo shows at The Gallery Of Graphic Arts.  His current work can be seen at WarrenKloner.com.  He is also a founding partner of “6 Foot 3 Design” whose furniture designs can be seen at 6FT3.com.  Kloner has recently played slide guitar for improvisational dances by Ferris.  He is pleased and honored to be working with Chris Ferris as a visual artist.

Julia Asher is an interdisciplinary performing artist based in New York City. Julia spent the past four years in Baltimore, Maryland as part of the inaugural class of dancers at the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University where she received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance and her Bachelor of Arts in Natural Sciences with a concentration in Mathematics and Neuroscience. During her time at Peabody, Julia performed works by Kyle Abraham, Sidra Bell, Yin-Yue, Marjani Forte-Saunders, and Christian Denice in addition to many more. Upon graduation, Julia relocated to New York City to join Abarukas under the direction of Yoshito Sakuraba. Additionally, Julia works at One Day Dance as a video editor and community manager. Julia is incredibly excited to join Chris Ferris for her upcoming project!

Chris Ferris & Dancers premiered Seasonal-Just in Time as a half evening work at Green Space Studio, Long Island City, NY in October 2022. Urban Pastoral was performed in Oct. of 2021 at Summit Rock, Central Park NYC with 10 dancers, live music by Human Time Machine and sculptural lights by Warren Kloner. This revival of the outdoor performance took place as the sun went down and was free and open to the public. Chris Ferris & Dancers presented Unquantifiable (excerpts) on 11/2/19 at Alison Cook Beatty’s Artists in Notion and on 10/15/19 at Dixon Place’s Fast Forward. The full evening work, Unquantifiable premiered at Roulette, Brooklyn NY on Feb. 17, 2019 receiving a Mertz Gilmore Foundation Late Stage Production Stipend. The REAL Suite was performed at Fast Forward, Dixon Place Sept. 2018. Chris Ferris & Dancers performed Rampaging Light and REAL Suite at Roulette, Brooklyn NY in Feb. 2018 and the Lenox Hill Neighborhood House, NYC in March 2018.

Alli Bradley, dancer

Alli Bradley is a New York-based dance artist and choreographer. She received her BFA in Dance Performance and Choreography from Ohio University. Alli has danced in works choreographed by Ani Javian, Douglas Nielson, Leslie Dworkin, Nathan Andary, Chungxin Wei, Emily Barasch, and Chris Ferris. Additionally, Alli was a company member of Wild She Dances from 2017-2020. In addition to concert dance, she has also been featured in the music video “You Are” by Raia Was and “Agoraphobia” by Katherine Huggard. Currently, she is choreographing a dance theatre work with her co-collaborators, Olvia Cancelli and Daniel Neiden.

Rachael Venner has performed in classical, contemporary, and modern works with companies including Donald/Byrd The Group, Cortez&Co. Contemporary Ballet, Milwaukee Ballet, Karen Reedy Dance, Connecticut Ballet, and Albany Berkshire Ballet. Rachael received her MS in Dance/Movement Therapy in 2018 and works full-time as a dance/movement therapist and licensed creative arts therapist in a Bronx hospital where she uses the healing aspects of dance as nonverbal communication and personal expression to support people with mental illness. She lives in NYC with her husband, two children, and their Westie. Rachael is pleased to be dancing with Chris Ferris & Dancers again.

Rachael Venner, dancer

Kelly Ireland is from Slippery Rock, PA where she began her dance training at the age of 5. She attended high school at Lincoln Park Performing Arts Charter School as a dance major and graduated from Florida State University with a BFA in dance and minor in hospitality. Kelly is a New York Riptide Dancer for the National Lacrosse League and can be seen dancing in promotional videos for Elly Shepley, creator of Sneaker Jazz®.. She recently joined the cast of Woof Woof the Shadow Pup as an apprentice which just premiered its first public performance in Connecticut. Kelly is also an experienced choreographer, dance educator, and arts administrator. She is currently an outreach teaching artist for Steffi Nossen School of Dance and has been a guest instructor at studios across the country including Michigan, Oregon, Wisconsin, Nevada, and more. As a choreographer, her work has been presented at Florida State University, One Day Dance, and various regional and national dance competitions. Kelly is the former Content Marketing Manager for Ballet Hispánico and continues this work as a freelance marketer and administrator.

Kelly Ireland, dancer

Loren Kiyoshi Dempster uses a combination of cello, computer, electronics, songwriting, secondary instruments, composition, improvisation, and notated scores to create and perform music. He is deeply interested in the relationships between movement, space, and sound, and has created and performed music with many collaborators, including Harrison Atelier, BK Soul, Chris Ferris, Dahlia Nayar, projectLIMB, Trio Tritticali, Lower Left, and Margaret Paek. His compositions have been presented at The Stone, Roulette, Issue Project Room, Wesleyan College, and at Chez Bushwick, a 2007 Bessie Award winning performance arts space of which he was a founding member. He toured extensively with Merce Cunningham performing Interscape and Biped. Now based in Appleton, WI from Queens, NY, Dempster has taught as an Instructor of music at Lawrence University and as a guest artist at Renaissance High School for the Arts. He has performed in the Wisconsin area at Lawrence University, UW Milwaukee, UW Oshkosh/FoxCities, Kohler Arts Center, Artists Guild, the Draw, and the 602 Club. For more information: www.lorendempster.com

Loren Kiyoshi Dempster, composer/musician

photo: Eric MacLean

Sophia Diehl holds a degree in Dance and Religion from St. Olaf College and a certificate in Contemporary Dance from Gibney Dance Company's Professional Training Program. She has performed with Minneapolis-based companies Stuart Pimsler Dance & Theater and ARENA Dances and New York-based companies Lines of Energy, Vashti Dance Theater, Valerie Green/Dance Entropy, Chris Ferris & Dancers and Ballaro Dances. Through a grant from the Utah Arts Council, Sophia choreographed and produced two site-specific dance films in 2020 and premiered them at the Salt Lake City Public Library to generate dialogue around place-based dance. She has created new work as an Artist Resident at Bearnstow in Maine (2018) and as a selected artist for the Take Root program at Green Space in Queens (2023).

Sophia Diehl, dancer

photo: Christine Fischer