La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club Presents Works from Jade Charon & Tiffany Merritt-Brown

La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club will present intimate works by Hunter College MFA Dance faculty members Tiffany Merritt-Brown and Jade Charon, exploring the enduring power of Black technology, ufemininity, kinship, spirituality, and ancestry as part of the 21st annual La MaMa Moves! Dance Festival. Performances are Friday, April 17 at 7pm, Saturday April 18 at 6pm, and Sunday April 19 at 4pm at 74A East 4th St., The Club. Tickets are $30 (general), $25 (students/seniors), with a $50 Support the Artists ticket option. Tickets are available here. Festival packages start at $45 and are available at https://ci.ovationtix.com/42/store/packages. Additionally, the first 10 tickets of each performance are $10 (limit 2 per person).

Merritt-Brown’s Tender is the Night considers what emerges in collective care. Charon’s Gold Pylon seeks the gateway of the higher self.

Tender Is the Night is an immersive choreographic work that brings to the forefront the rich interior worlds of Black women, illuminating how care, tension, and becoming shape sistahood and kinship. Centered on the question, What if tenderness were our inheritance? the work unfolds through a distinctive and intimate movement language, delving into the complexities of Black femininity—its strength, vulnerability, and compassion. It explores tenderness as something to be nurtured, negotiated, and protected, while questioning how openness and boundaries foster self-preservation. Moving between closeness and distance, stillness and release, it invites audiences to witness vulnerability unfolding over time. Tender Is the Night offers dance as a communal act of restoration, a love letter to Black women’s enduring care and legacy. Excerpts of Tender Is the Night have been presented at BAAD! and at the University of Wisconsin–Madison Dance Department’s Moonshine Series, curated by Chris Walker.

Tiffany Merritt-Brown is a choreographer, performer, and educator whose work centers the interior lives of Black women and their embodied knowledge. She holds a B.F.A. in Dance from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and an M.F.A. in Dance & Social Justice from the University of Texas at Austin. She creates immersive choreographies that function as prayer, testimony, and visionary invitation, exploring tenderness, kinship, and care as sites of survival and connection. Grounded in Black feminist thought and radical imagination, her work positions dance as a space for inquiry, ritual, and collective life. She is an alumna of the Dancing While Black Choreographic Fellowship with Angela’s Pulse and the Jacob’s Pillow Ann & Weston Hicks Choreographers Fellowship. Her work has been presented nationally and internationally at venues including Arts On Site (NYC), BAAD!, CADD (Collegium for African Diaspora Dance), Detroit Dance City Festival, The Kaye Playhouse, Miami Dade College, and WDA-A in Puebla, Mexico. tiffanymerrittbrown.com

Creative Team Credits

Dancers

Evan Beek

Zion Elle Lawrence

Samara Walker

Jalisa Wallerson

Heaven Wilburn

Choreographer and Director

Tiffany Merritt-Brown

Music Composed by

Musical Mix featuring Aretha Franklin, Ella Fitzgerald, Etta James, Jazmine Sullivan, Sarah Vaughan, Sneha, and the Haxan Cloak.

Gold Pylon is an inquiry into how testimonies from the Black church tradition function as intercessory technology — a gateway to the higher self. Using audio recordings of Jade Charon’s grandmother, this multimedia work moves across past, present, and future, honoring memory, lineage, and transformation. While the first iteration centered on Charon's own testimonies, this version invites testimonies from other Black girls, expanding the work toward collective voice and shared spiritual connection. The piece is part of her ongoing multimedia research project Gold, created to emPOWER Black communities by connecting them to gold’s spiritual, metaphysical, and ancestral resonance through dance, film, sound, and writing.

Jade Charon is an award-winning choreographer, filmmaker, interdisciplinary artist, educator, and mother. She is the creator of the multimedia project and children’s book Gold: Made Just for You, exploring empowerment, healing, and spirituality in Black communities. Her acclaimed films Reverse (2016), featured by The New York Times, and Recharge (2020) have screened internationally. She has received fellowships and residencies, including the Angela’s Pulse Dancing While Black Fellowship, the Bill T. Jones/New York Live Arts Fresh Tracks Artist Residency, the GALLIM Moving Women Residency, and the Ann & Weston Hicks Choreography Fellowship at Jacob’s Pillow. She earned degrees from UCLA and Columbia College Chicago and is pursuing an Ed.D. at Teachers College, Columbia University. jadecharon.com

Creative Team Credits

Dancers

Gabrielle Loren

A’shey Clemont

Shania Jones

Janae Moses

Ayana Williams

Choreographer and Director

Jade Charon

Visual Designer and Technologist

Ker Chen

Music Composed by

Farai Malianga