Joy Mariama Smith ~ Keywords: black joy, empathy & agency, pleasure, community, QTBIPOC+, consent, embodiment, identity, movement, relationality, spatial analysis, performance, collaboration

A native Philadelphian currently based in Amsterdam, NL, Joy Mariama Smith’s work primarily addresses the conundrum of projected identities in various contexts. A sub-theme, or ongoing question in their work is: What is the interplay between the body and it’s physical environment? Rooted in socially engaged art practice, they are a performance/installation/movement artist, activist, facilitator, curator and architectural designer. They have a strong improvisational practice spanning 20 years. When they choose to teach, they actively try to uphold inclusive spaces.

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Joy Mariama Smith (1976, United States) is an installation and performance artist, activist, dramaturg, and architectural designer. They* studied at the Dutch Art Institute in Arnhem; the NewSchool of Architecture & Design in San Diego; L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris; and Oberlin College in Ohio. Their work has been performed internationally, including at It's OK, Commoning Uncertainties: Calibrating Intimacies, Oude Kerk, Amsterdam; If I Can’t Dance Edition VI – Event and Duration, Amsterdam; SoLow Festival, Philadelphia; Freedom of Movement, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; and, Lecken, Berlin, Germany. They were a BAK fellow 2019-2020. Currently, they teach at the School for New Dance Development (SNDO) in Amsterdam. As a freelancer they often teach internationally in Belgium, Germany, Netherlands and the US at various academic institutions.

*They/them/their: third person singular gender-neutral pronoun.

Joy Mariama Smith's 20 minute presentation Not Dutch: An examination of the abstract relational dynamics of the other, remixed for Maelstrom Slow Dance - DAI's 3 day performance-lecture marathon, June 2017
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