COLLABORATIVE RESIDENCY, INTERNSHIP & FELLOWSHIP
AADF Collaborative Residency, Internship & Fellowship (CRIF) is a multi-year professional development and cultural empowerment program serving early to mid-career AAPI choreographers and dance artists, fostering new artistic growth, important leadership development, and deepened cultural engagement.
COLLABORATIVE RESIDENCY SHOWCASE
We are proud to present our AADF2026 choreographic residents and mentees in their culminating showcase, after months of research, collaboration, and deep introspection.
Directors: Dr. grace shinhae jun and Joyce Lien Kushner
Residents: hannah 하연 joo and Forest Lee
Mentees: Vrisika Chauhan and Jess Dizon.
Intern: Deanna Magpali
Technical Director/Lighting Design: Zane Shrem-Besnoy
Logo Designer: Des Enano
AADF2026 RESIDENTS
Forest Lee
Forest Lee (they/them) is a dance artist, educator, and political organizer, working and residing on Kumeyaay and Tongva land. They have performed around the world, dancing for Olivia Rodrigo, Doechii, and Channel Tres, and they have had the pleasure of working with choreographers such as Robbie Blue, Joyce Lien Kushner, Christopher K. Morgan, and Dolly Sfeir. Forest strives to use movement art and dance as tools for collective healing, liberation, and investigation of topics such as identity, connection, and the human experience as a whole. They are deeply informed by their work as an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, and are dedicated to fighting for a world in which all people have the right to live dignified, happy, and healthy lives. Forest views art, especially dance, as an integral component for achieving the world we all deserve.
hannah 하연 joo
hannah 하연 joo (she/they) is an artist, program builder, and educator based in Tovaangar (traditional Tongva/Gabrielino lands aka Los Angeles). Hannah has performed throughout Southern California, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and New York with Courtyard Dancers, Agora Dance, Donna Sternberg & Dancers, BrockusRED, Mia Moraru, and Alice Lousen & Co, and they are currently a member of the 고은춤 무용단 Goeun Traditional Korean Dance Company. Hannah's movement practice explores the transmutation of grieving, mourning, and funeral rituals in the Korean diaspora as a source for resistance, mobilization, and collective liberation.
AADF2026 MENTEES
Vrisika Chauhan
Vrisika Chauhan is a South Asian dancer, choreographer, artist, and dance scholar in making, based in San Diego. She was born and raised in the Bay Area, CA, where she trained in Odissi, Indian classical dance, from the age of 11. Through her time as an undergrad at UC San Diego, she choreographed for the Theatre and Dance Department showcases where she grew love for making work and training in multiple different dance disciplines. She has also received the opportunity to work with CONTRA-TIEMPO Activist Dance Theater, Ana Maria Alvarez, Kara Mack, and Dr. grace shinhae jun. work with CONTRA-TIEMPO Activist Dance Theater, Ana Maria Alvarez, Kara Mack, and Dr. grace shinhae jun. Her work is rooted in social justice and research using the lens of her South Asian heritage to share stories that are often stigmatized in society. Through her work she hopes to inspire, question, and imagine a world that respects our shared humanity.
Jess Dizon
Jess Dizon is a dance artist and educator who specializes in whacking, a queer club dance rooted in play, gesture, and reclamation. Her work is oriented towards joy and connection; often with intentions of building communal spaces and connecting movers to dance history and embodied knowledge. Her choreography highlights club dance vocabularies and has been showcased across the West Coast. Jess earned her MFA in Dance: Creative Practice from Saint Mary's College of CA, and leads local dance efforts through her work with Culture Shock Training Academy, Whacking San Diego, San Diego Unified School District, Heart2Art, and Fundamental.
AADF2026 INTERN
Deanna Magpali
Deanna Magpali is a San Diego-based creative event producer and social media specialist with roots in building events for the AANHPI community since her time at SDSU. They are deeply driven by the art of storytelling, most especially in working with various up-and-coming artists and local organizations. With a high respect for all art forms, she has worked on various social media teams including Pacific Arts Movement, Sweet Dreams Dance Company, Girls Like Girls Street Team, and now, AADF.
AADF MENTORS & CO-PRODUCERS
Dr. grace shinhae jun
Dr. grace shinhae jun is a mother, wife, educator, and mover. She is the daughter of a South Korean immigrant and a North Korean refugee, and the founder of bkSOUL performance company. Her research and artistic practices are grounded in Hip Hop culture and cross cultural collaborations that honor her ancestral lineage.
In 2001, she founded bkSOUL, a performance collective of educators, artists, storytellers, and organizers merging together movement, spoken word poetry, and live music. Their work has been presented in Trolley Dances, WOW Festival, Live Arts Festival, Philadelphia Fringe Festival, Dumbo Arts Festival, San Diego International Fringe Festival, and at Link’s Hall. grace has also choreographed for numerous staged plays, most notably for Will Power's "The Seven" at Occidental College.
Her scholarship includes publications in the Oxford Handbook of Hip Hop Dance Studies and the International Association for the Study of Popular Music Journal, and is the co-editor with MiRi Park for Dance Studies Association’s 2022 Conversations Across the Field of Dance Studies “Cyber-Rock: A Virtual Hip Hop Listening Cypher”. She co-organized the 2025 Show & Prove Hip Hop Studies Conference and co-directs the Asian American Dance Festival in San Diego.
grace received her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College and her PhD in Drama and Theatre from UCSD/UCI. With over 30 years of teaching experience, she is currently an Assistant Professor of Dance at San Diego City College, where she also serves on the Sankofa Social Justice & Education Conference committee, She is a teaching artist with transcenDANCE Youth Arts and has been a continuing lecturer at UC San Diego, where she was the recipient of the 2022/2023 Barbara and Paul Saltman Distinguished Teaching Award. She is most grateful to her husband Dr. Jesse Mills and their two children who keep her grounded and full of joy.
Joyce Lien Kushner
Joyce Lien Kushner is a second generation Taiwanese American dance artist, teacher, and maker, trained in modern, contemporary, ballet and jazz, and certified in Progressing Ballet Technique®. She has trained dancers of all ages, nourishing a philosophy that all bodies dance. She has performed and collaborated with artists throughout California since 1987 – Modern City Repertoire, Strong Pulse Dance, Epiphany Dance Theater, Surhabi Suraf, Sarah Bush Dance, Amy Lewis, Five Feet Dance, and Chris Black Dance. In 2015, she founded TILTshift Dance in San Francisco.
Now back in her hometown of San Diego, Joyce continues her teaching and choreographic practice, while striving to build community among dance artists, uplift their voices, and create opportunities. In 2024, she was awarded an 18-month artist residency by NTC Foundation in ARTS DISTRICT Liberty Station to help further these endeavors. In 2025 under TILTshift Dance, she developed and co-produced AADF, San Diego’s first Asian American Dance Festival - a project born of her deep desire to carve out space for AAPI dance artists to share their stories, in their own voices, on their own bodies.
Joyce currently teaches at Lynch Dance Institute, Malashock Dance and Balletiquette, as well as guest teaches throughout San Diego County. She proudly serves on Disco Riot’s board and plays an active role in its continued success.
