Who We Are

Holly Benedetti

In 2001 Holly began her exploration into the circus arts, beginning with fire performance – dancing, eating, and manipulation. In 2003 Holly co-founded Femmes du Feu Creations and in 2007 the company turned its focus towards aerial dance including silks, rope, hoop, harness, bungee, static and dance trapeze. As Artistic Director of Femmes du Feu Creations, Holly has created, performed and presented many contemporary circus works, including her recent solo project In the Fire, the early years show Tweet Tweet, and The Lonely Child Project with Angola Murdoch and opera singer Stacey Dunlap.

Holly has always been a strong advocate for community engagement. In 2019 Holly and her family moved to Welland, Ontario, in the Niagara region to open a brand new community art space – The Bank Art House. She believes that art has the ability to inspire, educate, and bring people together to build stronger communities. She is currently an active member on the board of the Welland Business Improvement Association (BIA) and is working with the City of Welland to promote circus within the city. Outside of her performance life Holly is a mother of two, a certified yoga instructor (2001 graduate), a Doctor of Osteopathy (2008 graduate) and continues to teach circus classes and workshops around Ontario and Manitoba.

Peter Benedetti

Peter Benedetti has been working in the entertainment production industry for over 24 years. He specializes as a rigger and production manager. 16 years ago, Peter began working in circus and stunt rigging. As a rope access technician and specialist rigger, Peter has worked with a variety of prominent companies such as Femmes du Feu Creations as well as independent artists Globally. He has toured with Cirque Musica, Kinky Boots, Rock Of Ages and installed arena shows for Cirque Du Soleil. Peter also has extensive experience in fabrication. His rigging experience led to requests for custom builds such as apparatuses, rigging systems, brackets and more . Peter is founder of Upstage Dynamics Inc, which has a fabrication division, building circus apparatuses equipment and custom rigging solutions. Peter has built and installed rigging equipment in a variety of situations including for an Ontario Heritage Trust building, The Elgin And Winter Garden Theater in Toronto, Ontario.

In 2019 Peter and his family moved to Welland, Ontario, in the Niagara region to open a brand new community art space – The Bank, Art House. There, he is combining his skills in fabrication, rigging, production management, and sound and lighting in order to create a new venue and circus centre that promises to become an important community cultural hub and creation space for the area.

Co-Founders

Lindsay Goodtimes

Artist, Collaborator, Co-founder

Lindsay Goodtimes has been entertaining audiences for the past two decades. After graduating from Toronto Dance Theatre in 1998 she spent many years performing and choreographing in the US, Canada and abroad. Her travels took her to South East Asia where Lindsay trained at the Thai fire school.  It was there she was first introduced to the circus arts. Upon returning from her travels she was impassioned with a great desire to incorporate fire arts in dance, it was at that time that Lindsay co-founded Femmes Du Feu with Holly Treddenick as a vehicle to explore this fusion.  Lindsay was honoured to be a part of the Circus Orange team for many years and participated in their trade mark spectacle performances at JFL Montreal, Winterlude Ottawa and Cavalcade Toronto to name a few. She began her aerial training with Sabrina Pringle in 2006 and is thrilled with the new direction that Sabrina and Holly have guided FDF into.  A women of many interests, Lindsay has been a member of multiple bands over the years from Punk Rock to Kindie, Lindsay utilizes different types of performance mediums to explore human expression with the ultimate goal of entertainment.

Sabrina Pringle

Chair

Sabrina is a mover, creator, entrepreneur, and community builder. Her career has spanned performing, choreographing, rigging, and teaching hundreds of students over the last three decades. She has worked with a diverse range of people in various settings, choreographing within complex rigging, set, and site-specific designs.

Her work includes performances on tall ships, skyscrapers, the sides of buildings, outdoor structures, circus tents, and small winding rooms—rarely a blank stage. Past collaborators include The Caravan Stage Barge, Circus Orange, DNA Theatre, and Company Blonde. She also served as Co-Artistic Director of Femmes du Feu from 2008 to 2012.

Since 2013, Sabrina has focused on developing Circus in the Trees, a rural circus school in Southwestern Ontario.

Board of Directors

Kosar Dakhilalian

Artist, Collaborator, Admin Staff

Kitsuné Soleil

Artist, Collaborator, Admin Staff

Rachel Braithwaite

Vice President

Missy Fishman

Treasurer

Jackie Houghton

Secretary

Artistic Collaborators

Veronika Anissimova

Performer, Opus 8

Rebecca Claborn

Performer, Opus 8

Lara Ebata

Artist, Collaborator

Jackie Houghton

Writer, Social Media Manager

Sara Porter

Artistic Collaborator, Creative Coach, Dramaturge

Katy Clark

Performer, Opus 8

Jane Fingler

Performer, Opus 8

Ruth Howard

Project Co-lead, Co-facilitator

Tanis Macarthur

Costume Designer

Sara Lou Routley

Workshop Facilitator

Alex Bulmer

Accessibility Consultant, Dramaturge

Monica Dottor

Artist, Collaborator, Director

Miranda Forbes

Administration and Producing, Dance Umbrella of Ontario

Emily Hughes

Artist, Collaborator

Bryan Martin

Performer, Opus 8

Kitsune Soleil

Workshop Facilitator

Robert Busiakiewicz

Performer, Opus 8

Peter Drobac

Choir Director, Opus 8

Natalie Fullerton

Artist, Collaborator

Diana Lopez-soto

Artist, Collaborator

Angola Murdoch

Artist, Collaborator

Sara Torrie

Costume Designer

Kosar Dakhilalian

Artist, Collaborator, Admin Staff

Kosar is a theatre artist and director based in St. Catharines. She has her master’s in Studies in Comparative Literature and Arts and was the Editor in Chief of Zeitgeist Courier, a magazine of literature and arts, for two years. Kosar has worked with Young People’s Theatre and have been a teaching assistant at the Department of Dramatic Arts at Brock University. Kosar’s play, Ruby, was a part of Niagara’s 2023 In the Soil Festival.

Kitsuné Soleil

Artist, Collaborator, Admin Staff

Kitsuné is a 2Spirit, Plains Cree (Nehiyaw), a multi-disciplinary artist residing on Treaty 3. They’re currently working on their first play called “H.E.R. Show,” which explores the dangers of social media and toxic relationships. They are managing ways to display it virtually as a work in progress through pandemic times.

She’s constantly exploring themes around culture and balancing today’s digital world to intersect in that work. In addition, she continues to pursue theatre arts through writing and artist collaborations in safe distances and safe spaces in these trying times.

As an imaginative soul, she likes to express herself through fashion and storytelling online through her socials and bringing light to indigenous issues.

Rachel Braithwaite

Vice President

Rachel lives in Welland with her family. She works for the St. Catharines Downtown Association, supporting more than 500 small businesses through events, marketing, advocacy, and more. She also sits on the Board for the Ontario Business Improvement Association.

Missy Fishman

Treasurer

Melissa Fishman is a 2-Spirit Salish woman of the Thunderbird clan, raised in Tkaronto with origins in Lillooet Valley First Nation in B.C.

Her work over the last decade has focused on access and support for Indigenous communities, primarily through student outreach, recruitment, and retention at the post-secondary level. She shares her passion for learning and seeks ways to overcome barriers to education and community connection within local Indigenous communities.

Jackie Houghton

Secretary

Circus has taken on an ever-expanding role in Jackie’s life for over a decade. She started as a student learning to navigate the silks in a small Toronto studio and has since become an accomplished student and performer on various apparatus, including silks, lyra, and hula hoop.

A few years ago, Jackie realized she could use her journalism background to amplify the Ontario circus community. Since then, she has written about circus and provided critiques for The Circus Diaries (UK), Circus Talk (USA), My Entertainment World (Canada), and Femmes du Feu Creations (Canada). What once seemed like a dream is now an integral part of her personal and professional development—one she hopes to continue building as part of the Femmes du Feu team.

Veronika Anissimova

Performer, Opus 8

Veronika Anissimova has been praised for her “lovely presence” (Berkshire Fine Arts) and “impressively quick and precise coloratura” (Ludwig van Toronto). Since taking part in Marilyn Horne’s The Song Continues series at Carnegie Hall in 2018, she has presented recitals for the Arts & Letters Club of Toronto, the Linden Project, the Noon at Met series at the Metropolitan United Church, Music at Midday at St. James Cathedral, and others. This season she can be heard in recital as part of the Concerts @100 concert series and in Mahler’s Rückert Lieder with the Hart House Orchestra; she was among the 2022 Handel Aria Competition’s top 20, and was an Art of Song fellow with the 2021 Toronto Summer Music Festival. Veronika performed Mozart’s Exsultate, jubilate with the Hart House Orchestra as a winner of their 2019 Concerto Competition; select soloist credits include Despina cover for Brott Opera, Polluce in Cavalli’s Elena with the Toronto Consort, Zulma in Rossini’s L’Italiana in Algeri with the Toronto Concert Orchestra, Handel’s Messiah with the Peterborough Singers, and Bach’s Mass in B Minor with the American Bach Soloists Academy. Winner of the 2014 National Gold Medal at the Royal Conservatory of Music, Veronika holds a MMus (2018) in historical voice performance and a BMus (Honours, 2016) in piano and Italian studies from the University of Toronto. www.veronika-anissimova.com

Rebecca Claborn

Performer, Opus 8

Rebecca Claborn, Alto has recently sung with Pro Coro Canada, the Choir of St. James Cathedral, Cappella Nova Mundi, Tallis Scholars, Gabrieli Consort and the Theatre of Early Music, with whom she has recorded two discs. She holds music degrees from the Universities of New Hampshire and Alberta where she was the 2009 winner of the Alberta Baroque Ensemble Concerto Competition. She performs as a soloist all across Canada, with a repertoire ranging from the Renaissance to the present day. Away from singing, she succumbs to her indelible passion to master the clawhammer banjo.

Lara Ebata

Artist, Collaborator

Lara has been a dancer for over 25 years. Her formative training began with ballet with the Royal Academy of Dance. An insatiable appetite for dance has led to studies in modern, jazz, Indian dance, Afro-Caribbean, hip hop, Latin ballroom, tap, fire dance, stilts, and various aerial apparatus. Since graduating from the York University Dance Program in 2000, Lara has performed across North America in festivals such as the Toronto Fringe Festival of Independent Dance Artists, Dusk Dances, the Toronto, Ottawa, London, & Hamilton Fringe Festivals, the Yonge St. Festival, Just for Laughs (Montreal & Toronto), Cavalcade of Lights, the Calgary Stampede, Wintercity, the Rhubarb Festival, and the Second City Late Night Cabaret. Lara has had the opportunity to work with Toronto circus companies such as Circus Orange, Femmes du Feu, A2D2, and Suspended Animation, and is co-artistic director of her own small fire dance company, Goodness Gracious

Jackie Houghton

Writer, Social Media Manager

Circus has taken on an ever-expanding role in Jackie’s life for over a decade now. She has grown from a student learning to navigate the silks in a small Toronto studio and is now a more accomplished student and performer of various apparatus, including silks, lyra, and hula hoop. Several years ago Jackie realized that she could utilize her journalism background as a means to amplify the Ontario circus community here and abroad. Since, she has written about circus and provided circus critique for The Circus Diaries (UK), Circus Talk (USA), My Entertainment World (Canada), and of course, Femmes du Feu Creations (Canada). What once seemed a dream, is now an integral part of her personal and professional development that she hopes to continue to build on as a part of the Femmes du Feu team.

Sara Porter

Artistic Collaborator, Creative Coach, Dramaturge

Sara Porter is a contemporary choreographer, multi-disciplinary dancer, performer, writer, mentor and teacher based in Toronto. Creator of over 30 works since 1990, her one-woman show Sara does a Solo – about returning to dancing after having 3 kids – premiered in 2014 and toured Canada and internationally. Her work is feminist, theatrical, quirky and engages a wide audience. Sara’s dance writing has been published in print and online in Canada and the UK for 30 years. She has taught contemporary dance theory and practice at colleges and universities in Canada and Scotland and is currently developing a practice melding memoir & movement that she teaches in-person and online internationally. Her one-woman show Getting to know your fruit – investigating the potential of queer memoir – was Covid cancelled and is being revisioned as a film.

Katy Clark

Performer, Opus 8

Soprano Katy Clark is a participant in the 2017-2018 Rebanks Family Fellowship and International Performance Residency. She recently won second place in the prestigious Harold Haugh Light Opera Competition in Jackson, Michigan. As well as singing with Shoestring Opera in Toronto, Katy sings with the Canadian Opera Company Chorus, and has sung with Michigan Opera Theatre. Favourite opera credits include The Queen of the Night in The Magic Flute, Cunegonde in Candide, and Madame Herz in The Impresario. She also has a deep passion for oratorio repertoire, and has sung as a soloist with the Elora Singers, the London Fanshawe Symphonic Chorus, the Detroit Medical Orchestra, and more. As a choral singer, Katy sings with the Elora Singers, and has sung with the Grammy winning University of Michigan Chamber Choir. Katy earned her Masters Degree in Voice Performance from the University of Michigan. In addition to her work as a soloist and performer, Katy teaches private voice and piano lessons in Toronto.

Jane Fingler

Performer, Opus 8

Jane Fingler is a Toronto-based soprano from Winnipeg who spends a lot of her time singing with other humans. She is a sought after chorister and soloist who has performed with groups including Tafelmusik, The Theatre of Early Music, The Pacific Baroque Orchestra, Choir 21, Ottawa Bach Choir, Elora Singers, and Winnipeg groups Canzona, Polycoro, Camerata Nova and the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, She is also a member of the newly formed Toronto vocal quintet Diapente, who will be giving their first performance in Dec 2022. Although she has a passion for performing and learning about early music (M.MUS Historical Performance, U of T, current DMA student Historical Performance, U of T) she also has performed a wealth of contemporary choral music in the Winnipeg New Music and Groundswell Festivals, and recently with Choir 21 in Toronto. She is thrilled to be performing with Opus 8 and Femme de Feu creations!

Ruth Howard

Project Co-lead, Co-facilitator

Ruth Howard is an interdisciplinary artist, and the founding Artistic Director of Jumblies Theatre + Arts: a company based in Toronto with an Ontario and Canada-wide reach, that makes art with, for and about people, places and the stories they hold. Ruth and Jumblies have created multi-year residencies in a series of Toronto neighbourhoods, resulting in large-scale productions and lasting Offshoots, as well as cross-country tours (Train of Thought and Four Lands), and many other collaborative community-engaged events, projects and productions. Ruth has worked across Canada and in the UK as a theatre designer, has taught at many universities, colleges and schools, mentored numerous emerging artists and organizations, and won awards and recognition for her work. Her most recent multi-year project with Jumblies is and Grounds for Goodness, a suite of short new works on the theme of ‘social goodness’.

Tanis Macarthur

Costume Designer

Tanis Sydney MacArthur has been an independent costumier for performing artists for more than 25 years. She is also an interpretive dance artist, choreographer, aerialist, stilt walker, prop maker and large scale inflatable sculpture artist. Clients of note include Femmes du Feu, Hamilton Aerial Group, Aeris Korper, Fly With Me Aerial Dance, Steel the Sky Aerial Arts, Team T&J, Mabel Moon, Learie McNicolls, Red Betty Theatre, Aoucheva Dance Studio, Defining Movement Dance Company, Hamilton Dance Company, MacDancers, Parahumans, the Acromaniacs and Artword Theatre. She executed wardrobe and creature design for the independent short film The Sail Tree by Radha Menon. She placed third nationally in the Smirnoff International Fashion Awards 1994 and regularly contributed original designs to Fashion Cares. She served as designer and key wardrobe for the film A Windigo Tale by Armand Garnet Ruffo. She designed and built The Arctic Fox and Inspired by Icebergs, outdoor installations of multiple 16′ tall inflated sculptures in collaboration with Cobalt Connects.

Sara Lou Routley

Workshop Facilitator

Sara Lou Routley is a flying acrobat who grew up in Niagara Falls.She has been Creative Director to her troupe Harmonic Shadow Circus since c.2016. Harmonic Shadow Circus is a collaborative low frequency doom ensemble that uses handmade costumes, sounds, and animal masks to play the role of shapeshifters across various multidisciplinary circus
productions. These creative works explore fungi, urban animals, folk history, and historical spaces. Sara Lou is also an oil painter, sewist, and musician who enjoys incorporating these handmade elements into her shows. Mobility is one of Sara Lou’s special interests, and she loves to share mobility with others at any level, whether it’s on the ground or in the air. She lives in Niagara with her partner and their husky.

Alex Bulmer

Accessibility Consultant, Dramaturge

With 30 professional years across theater, television, film, radio, and education, Alex Bulmer is dedicated to inclusive collaborative art practice, fuelled by a curiosity of the improbable and deeply informed by her experience of becoming blind. She is activated by obstacles, well exposed to the absurd, and embraces the disciplines of generosity, listening, time, and uncertainty within her artistic and personal life. Alex is currently part-time Artistic Director of Common Boots Theatre, co-founder and artistic director of Cripping The Stage with The British Council, and the lead curator of Brave 2021 Festival: CoMotion, an international disability arts festival produced by Harbourfront Centre.

Monica Dottor

Artist, Collaborator, Director

Monica Dottor is a 10 time Dora Mavor Moore* award nominated artist in 5 different categories including Actor(3X), Choreographer(4X), Director (1X) and Costume Designer (1X) She’s a Dora winner with Matthew Mackenzie for Best Production of BEARS and a Dora winner For OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE IN A FEATURED ROLE with The Penelopiad ensemble (Nightwood).) DIRECTOR/CHOREOGRAPHER Credits: Beauty and the Beast (UofWindsor), A Blow in the Face (Nightwood), Big Love by Charles Mee at The University of Windsor, BEARS* (Punctuate Theatre/Alberta Aboriginal Arts, Theatre Centre, Factor, Belfry) THE OTHER (Pyretic/Company Blonde/TheatreFront/Soulpepper), The 94 Club (Crave Productions), The History of Drinking in Cavan (4th Line), MALARIA LULLABY (Company Blonde), TWEET TWEET (Femmes Du Feu/SOULPEPPER), Circus Sessions (Femmes Du Feu), Elemantal(Harbourfront Centre) CHOREOGRAPHY: ROSE*, Idomeneus, Sisters, The Chopin Project, Eurydice, Glenn, A Tender Thing, MARAT/SADE* (Soulpepper Theatre Company) IF/THEN (Sheridan University), The Penelopiad*(Nightwood), Craigslist Cantata*(Acting UpStage), The Red Queen Effect (7th Stage),The Russian Play* (Factory) The Hero of Hunter Street, Bombers,The Real McCoy, Queen Marie, Wounded Soldier, Berlin Blues (4th Line) The Shadow Walk of Millbrook (Co-writer&Choreographer). Selected THEATRE ACTING: The Cold War (Video Cabaret), The Chopin Project (Soulpepper),The Other (Pyretic Productions/Company Blonde,Theatre Front/Soulpepper), The Hero of Hunter Street, The Bad Luck Bank Robbers (4th Line), The Penelopiad*, Petrichor (Kitchenband), The Red Queen Effect, SCRATCH*, Featuring Loretta (Factory), A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Overcoat*, The Middle Place (CanadianStage), Chekhov’s Heartache, Chekhov’s Shorts (Smith-Gilmour), HER2 (Nightwood Theatre) Selected TV/FILM ACTING: LUNE (TIFF), Private Eyes(CTV) Star Falls (NICKELODEON),Orphan Black (BBC America), Hemlock Grove (Netflix) The Shape of Rex (Factoria Films), Picture Day (Snitch Pictures-TIFF), Murdoch Mysteries, Saving Hope, Rookie Blue (CTV), Lost Girl (Showcase) 8 Bit Christmas (Warner Brothers), SkyMed (Paramount), Everything’s Going to Be Great! (GREAT Productions).

Monica has her M.F.A. in THEATRE from York University. www.monicadottor.com

Miranda Forbes

Administration and Producing, Dance Umbrella of Ontario

Miranda Forbes is an arts manager with a strong connection to the Toronto dance community. She graduated with honours from the Arts Administration and Cultural Management Program through Humber College and holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Performance Dance from Ryerson University.

In 2017, she began her role of Manager of Producing and Administration at the Dance Umbrella of Ontario (DUO). She has been fortunate to provide administrative support for Ontario Dance/Circus Artists including, Christine Friday, Esie Mensah, Holly Treddenick, Bill Coleman, Holly Small, Lua Shayenne and Roshanak Jaberi. Prior to joining the DUO team, she was the Executive Director of the Mississauga Children’s Choir (MCC) and now sits on MCC’s Board of Directors.

She is delighted to play an active role in supporting the Ontario dance community.

Emily Hughes

Artist, Collaborator

Emily Hughes is a multidisciplinary artist/creator using circus as a physical language to communicate through theatre, film, dance, visual art and installation. She is a classically trained actor, Pochinko clown, baby hand balancer, and has been performing as a professional aerialist for over 20 years. Parallel and intersecting with her solo work, she is also the co-Artistic Director of Hercinia Arts Collective, a non-profit performance company dedicated to collaboratively created circus through a multidisciplinary lens. For more of Emily’s work visit: emilyhughes.ca

Bryan Martin

Performer, Opus 8

Bryan Martin, Bass has been active in the Toronto choral and early music scenes for 35 years. He holds degrees in conducting and musicology from the University of Toronto, and is a founding member of Sine Nomine Ensemble for Medieval Music. He has appeared on stage with Poculi Ludique Societas (medieval drama), Toronto Masque Theatre, and in November will be part of Soundstreams’ production of Two Odysseys, a double bill of indigenous-language operas (Cree and Sami). In his spare time Bryan works on audiovisual media preservation at the University of Toronto Music Library, where he is also a cataloguer and the resident technology and early music geek. He likes to unwind by producing recordings, most recently for the choir of St. James’ Cathedral. He can frequently be seen attempting to convince his long-suffering wife that he really needs to do.

Kitsune Soleil

Workshop Facilitator

Kitsuné is a 2Spirit, Plains Cree (Nehiyaw), a multi-disciplinary artist residing on Treaty 3. They’re currently working on their first play called “H.E.R. Show,” which explores the dangers of social media and toxic relationships. They are managing ways to display it virtually as a work in progress through pandemic times. She’s constantly exploring themes around culture and balancing today’s digital world to intersect in that work. In addition, she continues to pursue theatre arts through writing and artist collaborations in safe distances and safe spaces in these trying times. As an imaginative soul, she likes to express herself through fashion and storytelling online through her socials and bringing light to indigenous issues.

Robert Busiakiewicz

Performer, Opus 8

Robert studied at the Royal Academy of Music and King’s College London before being invited to the Yeomanry of the Worshipful Company of Musicians in 2013. Since then he completed a Masters in Music with a choral scholarship at King’s College, Cambridge. He was awarded the Lord Mayor’s Prize for Composition and his works have featured on BBC Radio, London Festival of Contemporary Music and are recorded by Priory Records. He has performed across the globe in venues such as the Sydney Opera House, Royal Albert Hall, the Barbican, the Hermitage Theatre, St. Thomas Fifth Avenue and Bleinheim Palace. As well as being Director of Music at St. James Cathedral, he can frequently be found helping people move house (against his will), and shouting at traffic.

Peter Drobac

Choir Director, Opus 8

Peter Drobac is a cantor and choir director in the Orthodox Church, and has curated the Sacred Music in a Sacred Space series out of Trinity College Chapel for the past 12 years.

He has a BSc from UofT in molecular plant biology, and both an MDiv and MA in liturgical music from St. Vladimir’s Seminary in NY. This is his first stage role as a personification of smoke.

Natalie Fullerton

Artist, Collaborator

Natalie Fullerton is a classically trained dancer who also holds a BFA in dance from York University. After completing her degree she discovered the circus arts and has never looked back. In addition to co-directing her own fire and aerial company, Goodness Gracious…, she has also performed across Canada, the USA, Europe and Asia with various companies and choreographers. Most recently she has been working with Circus Orange, Femmes du Feu, Les Coquettes and Lady Luck Productions on selected events including, Airship with Femmes du Feu as part of the 2011 Rhubarb Festival, City of Toronto Wintercity Festival 2010, Femmes du Feuʼs production Head First, winner of Toronto Fringe Festival 2009 Best of Fringe award and Patronʼs Pick, The Calgary Stampede 2008 and Just For Laughs 2006 (Montreal), 2007 (Toronto) with Circus Orange, as well as an ongoing residency at Revival with Les Coquettes.

Diana Lopez-soto

Artist, Collaborator

I am a mother, land caretaker and a Mexican/Canadian multidisciplinary artist (producer, director, choreographer, rigging designer, performer and visual artists) My work explores the relationships between ecology, body and performance art with a focus on process, decolonization and sustainability. I was born and raised in Mexico and hold a BFA from Emily Carr University. I have participated, exhibited, presented and performed my work in France, Panama, Mexico, Costa Rica, USA and Canada. I work in collaboration with other artisans, knowledge keepers, sculpture artists, dancers and riggers. I am a member of Vanguardia Dance Projects, work for Circus Orange and also collaborate with Ana Prada, Alejandro Ronceria, Femme Du Feu, Flying Solo, Hercinia Arts, Fly with Me and Look up Theatre.

www.dianalopezsoto.com

www.willowind.ca

Angola Murdoch

Artist, Collaborator

Angola’s childhood was spent mostly upside down, dancing and doing gymnastics while growing up on her family farm in Grey County, Ontario. She has trained and performed in a multitude of movement disciplines including over fifteen years of capoeira, aerial circus and acrobatics. Her strength is creating new aerial equipment that make sense in a theatrical setting. Angola is an international performer. Some highlights include: Cirque Pacifica (Maui), Waiting for Calder (Art Gallery of Ontario), Planet Power (HarbourKids, Toronto), Maravilla (Second City, Toronto), Granmercy Theatre (NYC), Command Performance (Europe), and Zip Zap Circus (South Africa). Angola has graduated from the National Circus School in Montreal where she obtained the highest level of coaching certification for circus arts. She has taught all over the world offering social circus workshops and her unique master classes. Angola is thrilled and honoured to be part of the Femmes Du Feu team.

Sara Torrie

Costume Designer

Sara Torrie is a Canadian artist exploring the regenerative potential and ingrained intelligence found in textiles and objects. She is currently organizing her fashion project, Sartoria, to make more space for costume and installation work. her involvement with Femmes du Feu has included a number of costuming contracts/invitations including the great privilege to be part of Circus Sessions, in May 2019.

http://www.saratorrie.xyz

http://www.sartoria.ca