Rena Butler
Rena Butler hails from Chicago, IL, and began her studies at The Chicago Academy for the Arts. She studied overseas at Taipei National University of the Arts in Taiwan, and received her BFA from SUNY Purchase Conservatory of Dance. Rena performed with companies including Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, AIM by Kyle Abraham, Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company, David Dorfman Dance, The Kevin Wynn Collection, Pasos Con Sabor Salsa Dance Company, and Gibney Company.
Rena is a recipient of the prestigious 2019 Princess Grace Foundation Award for Choreography and San Francisco’s 2024 Isadora Duncan Dance Award for Outstanding Achievement in Choreography. She has created works for Het Nationale Ballet in The Netherlands, National Ballet of Canada, San Francisco Opera’s Orpheus and Euridice, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Norrdans in Sweden, AIM By Kyle Abraham, Gauthier Dance in Stuttgart, Germany, The Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Proximity, Cincinnati Ballet, Le Ballet de L’Opéra Grand Avignon and Arles Youth Ballet Company in France, The New Orleans Museum of Modern Art, SALT Dance, a film for Third Coast Percussion x Devonté Hynes/Blood Orange, Oregon Ballet Theater, The Juilliard School, Oklahoma City Ballet, Parsons Dance, TEDxChicago Virtual Salon 3.0: Design Your Life, Charlotte Ballet, BalletX, and more. She has been spotlighted in Dance Magazine’s On The Rise feature in 2013, and was the featured cover story for Dance Magazine’s November 2021 issue.
April Berry
April Berry is a dance director, master teacher, educator and former internationally acclaimed dancer with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. Berry has been actively involved in the field of dance education and community engagement for more than 30 years. She has created award‐winning education programs as Director of Community Engagement and Education for Kansas City Ballet, as Director of Education and Community Outreach for North Carolina Dance Theatre (now Charlotte Ballet) and as Director of Education and Community Programs at BalletMet Columbus. Ms. Berry has served on the dance faculty at Kansas City Ballet, Charlotte Ballet and at BalletMet Columbus in Ohio, and has served as adjunct faculty in the Department of Dance at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Her teaching experience includes guest instructor and lecturer at various universities and dance institutions in the U.S., including the School at Jacobs Pillow, and as a lead teaching artist representing several U.S. ballet organizations in various school systems around the country. Berry has presented at various conferences, including the Dance/USA Conference in Philadelphia, two National Dance Education (NDEO) Conferences, International Association for Blacks in Dance (IABD) Conferences, and the Collegium for African American Dance (CADD) Conference at Duke University. She authored “Building Bridges for Ballet’s Future” for Dance/USA’s online journal From the Green Room, has served on grants panels for the Missouri Arts Council, North Carolina Arts Council and the Arts & Science Council in Charlotte, and was the Founding chair of Dance USA’s Community Engagement and Education Directors Affinity Group. Berry’s professional training in ballet began in New York at the former National Academy of Ballet and Theatre Arts and at the Dance Theatre of Harlem. Subsequently, Berry studied modern dance techniques and jazz dance at Alvin Ailey American Dance Center (now the Ailey School) in New York and traveled to Cuba to study Caribbean folkloric and popular dance forms at the Escuela Nacional des Arts (National School of the Arts). A former principal dance artist with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT), Berry worked under the direction of Founding Artistic Director Alvin Ailey and Artistic Director Emerita Judith Jamison. Berry is featured in numerous dance books and several AAADT videos, performed on two televised Kennedy Center Honors Programs and served as a guest artist with several ballet companies, including the Teatro La Scala Ballet in Milan, Italy.
Sonia D'Orleans Juste
Former longtime principal dancer with Batsheva Dance Company.
Laina Reese
Laina Reese is a choreographer, educator and performer of dance. Laina received her MFA in Dance Performance & Pedagogy, as well as her Certificate of Study in Feminist Methodologies & Sexualities from Arizona State University. Her BFA was earned at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
Hope Boykin
Two-time Bessie Award winner Hope Boykin was an original member of Complexions, danced with PHILADANCO!, and performed for 20 years (2000-2020) with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. She has choreographed for numerous dance companies including PHILADANCO!, Dallas Black Dance Theatre, Minnesota Dance Theater, BalletX, Eisenhower Dance Detroit, Ballet Black of London, American Ballet Theatre Studio Company, The Philadelphia Ballet, and Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, and has created three works for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater: Acceptance In Surrender (2005), in collaboration with fellow Ailey company members Abdur-Rahim Jackson and Matthew Rushing; Go in Grace (2008), for the company’s 50th anniversary season with music by the award-winning singing group Sweet Honey in the Rock; and r-Evolution, Dream. (2016), inspired by the speeches and sermons of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., with original music by Ali Jackson.