Date & Time
7:00pm CDT - 8:30pm CDT
About This Event
Our Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellows offer a split bill Works-In-Progress showing featuring Tuli Bera, Jacinda Bullie, and Jaquanda Villegas. Additionally, Fall 2024 Resident Selena Lasley will show her Work in Progress, previously delayed last fall.
Bera, Bullie, and Villegas present to audiences the projects they have been investigating and rehearsing while incubating in the white box studio since January. Lasley will present work from her time in residence September - December, 2024.
FEATURED ARTISTS
Executive Director & Co Lead Creative, Jaquanda Saulter-Villegas (Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellow) is a Fly Girl Chicagoan by way of South Carolina, Jaquanda is one of the three Founders, and a Co- Creative Lead of Kuumba Lynx (KL) (Arts/ Education Organization). She has been engaging youth and their families in Hip Hop Arts Activism and Culturally Relevant programming for 25 years. Jaquanda get’s FREE as an Arts Educator, Mentor, Yoga Instructor, Shamanic Reiki Healer, Performance Artist, Arts Administrator, International Peace Movement Honorary Ambassador, and Hip Hop Theater Director. As a healer Jaquanda is dedicated to holding space for community to address harm, break generational curses, and interrupting systematic sabotage by re-engaging in indigenous and African healing practices.
Jacinda Bullie, aka Jah da Amp Mouth (Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellow), is an instigating art maker, creative activator, and practicing heart soother. This sage-burning Muslim seeks to practice gratitude & presence. Jacinda likes to write, perform, paint, talk story, move and engage in radical love play. She is a Hip Hop Theater producer, host, arts facilitator & manager who finds freedom in remembering that she is simply a spiritual being having an earthly experience.
Tuli Bera (Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellow) is a Bengali American movement artist. They draw from various styles of dance: Indian folk and classical forms, classical and contemporary ballet, modern, aerial dance and improvisation. Bera has collaborated and performed with various companies and individual artists: Ayako Kato, Aerial Dance Chicago, Ishti Collective, Ashwaty Chennat, Cristal Sabbagh's Freedom From and Freedom To and Darling Squire. Beyond performance, they support independent artists as a producer for dance and teach ballet and aerial dance for all ages.
Selena Lasley (she/they; Fall 2024 Co-MISSION Resident) is a Chicago-based artist. She is a graduate of Columbia College Chicago with a BA in Acting (2019). Selena also has studied Modern, West African, solo performance, vogue aesthetics, Physical theatre, and Improvisation. Selena continues performing and collaborating with multiple artists and has performed throughout Chicago. Being a Research-based artist, Selena is constantly creating, exploring, breaking theories and ideologies with their ongoing research in Psychology of creativity, social and theoretical concepts. The constant shifts of cultural and social climates within the African diaspora, American Dream, Gender identity, and the ongoing questions of non conformity has always been an underlying theme within their research based works. This will be their first residency at Links Hall and is very excited to be sharing the space!
About This Event
Our Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellows offer a split bill Works-In-Progress showing featuring Tuli Bera, Jacinda Bullie, and Jaquanda Villegas. Additionally, Fall 2024 Resident Selena Lasley will show her Work in Progress, previously delayed last fall.
Bera, Bullie, and Villegas present to audiences the projects they have been investigating and rehearsing while incubating in the white box studio since January. Lasley will present work from her time in residence September - December, 2024.
FEATURED ARTISTS
Executive Director & Co Lead Creative, Jaquanda Saulter-Villegas (Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellow) is a Fly Girl Chicagoan by way of South Carolina, Jaquanda is one of the three Founders, and a Co- Creative Lead of Kuumba Lynx (KL) (Arts/ Education Organization). She has been engaging youth and their families in Hip Hop Arts Activism and Culturally Relevant programming for 25 years. Jaquanda get’s FREE as an Arts Educator, Mentor, Yoga Instructor, Shamanic Reiki Healer, Performance Artist, Arts Administrator, International Peace Movement Honorary Ambassador, and Hip Hop Theater Director. As a healer Jaquanda is dedicated to holding space for community to address harm, break generational curses, and interrupting systematic sabotage by re-engaging in indigenous and African healing practices.
Jacinda Bullie, aka Jah da Amp Mouth (Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellow), is an instigating art maker, creative activator, and practicing heart soother. This sage-burning Muslim seeks to practice gratitude & presence. Jacinda likes to write, perform, paint, talk story, move and engage in radical love play. She is a Hip Hop Theater producer, host, arts facilitator & manager who finds freedom in remembering that she is simply a spiritual being having an earthly experience.
Tuli Bera (Spring 2025 Co-MISSION Fellow) is a Bengali American movement artist. They draw from various styles of dance: Indian folk and classical forms, classical and contemporary ballet, modern, aerial dance and improvisation. Bera has collaborated and performed with various companies and individual artists: Ayako Kato, Aerial Dance Chicago, Ishti Collective, Ashwaty Chennat, Cristal Sabbagh's Freedom From and Freedom To and Darling Squire. Beyond performance, they support independent artists as a producer for dance and teach ballet and aerial dance for all ages.
Selena Lasley (she/they; Fall 2024 Co-MISSION Resident) is a Chicago-based artist. She is a graduate of Columbia College Chicago with a BA in Acting (2019). Selena also has studied Modern, West African, solo performance, vogue aesthetics, Physical theatre, and Improvisation. Selena continues performing and collaborating with multiple artists and has performed throughout Chicago. Being a Research-based artist, Selena is constantly creating, exploring, breaking theories and ideologies with their ongoing research in Psychology of creativity, social and theoretical concepts. The constant shifts of cultural and social climates within the African diaspora, American Dream, Gender identity, and the ongoing questions of non conformity has always been an underlying theme within their research based works. This will be their first residency at Links Hall and is very excited to be sharing the space!
Date & Time
7:00pm CDT - 8:30pm CDT