upcoming

upcoming

performances

After the Last Red Sky by Body Watani Dance Project

2026 Tour Dates:

Westminster (Minneapolis, MN) March 6th, 2026 at 7pm
Arab American National Museum (Dearborn, MI) March 27 – 28, 2026
Uprising Theater (Chicago, IL) April 17-18, 2026

Details & tickets to be released soon.

This activity is made possible by the Bridge Fund for Dance program through the City of Minneapolis Arts & Cultural Affairs Department.
After the Last Red Sky was made possible with funding by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Theater Project, with lead funding from the Mellon Foundation and additional support from the Doris Duke Foundation.

workshops & community offerings

improvisation research :
sunday mornings in February

Feb 1, 8, 15 11:00-1:00pm
Located at MOVO | Ivy Building
Donation: $5-$20

About:

We center embodied research as a pathway towards understanding what the body already knows, and what our bodies can reveal to us especially when we practice collectively. The body-as-homeland research practice we work with invites participants into improvisational prompts that support reflections on ones’ own relation to place, homeland, ancestral wanderings, migration, displacement, exile and contemplations of what homeland means (to you / to us / to the land we dance on).

These sessions will be loosely guided, intentionally held containers for improvisation accompanied by live musical collaborators. A call and invitation to arrive to the space, meet inside a question or contemplation, and follow the winding road that is revealed amidst much unknowns.

* Participants should feel some comfortability or familiarity in such contexts.

This activity is made possible by the Bridge Fund for Dance program through the City of Minneapolis Arts & Cultural Affairs Department.
Body Watani Dance Project is a 2025-2027 Company in Residence at MOVO. Funding for this program made possible by the Jerome Foundation.

body watani class series :
monday nights in February

February 2, 9, 16, 7:15-8:45pm @ Threads Dance Nexus
February 23rd, 7:15-8:45pm @ Red Eye
Donation: $5 – $20

About:

Body Watani is a body-as-homeland research practice that began and continues to evolve from a Palestinian diasporic lens. Our offerings invite participants to investigate with us: how we research Arab and SWANA rooted movement in experimental, somatic, and contemporary contexts — while engaging directly in the politics of the region and the implications on our bodies and lands.

These classes will weave improvisation and choreographic studies that we are developing and that we have used in the creation of After the Last Red Sky.

* Participants should arrive with comfortability to explore their own bodily movement and learn choreographis that are both culturally specific and experimental.

This activity is made possible by the Bridge Fund for Dance program through the City of Minneapolis Arts & Cultural Affairs Department.
Body Watani Dance Project is a 2025-2027 Company in Residence at MOVO. Funding for this program made possible by the Jerome Foundation.

Dabke Workshops :
with Samer Karaja

Communitiy Dabke – All levels
Sunday February 1st, 6-8pm
@ MOVO | Ivy Building

Street Dabka – Intermediate
Wednesday February 4th, 6-8pm
@ Shawngram Institute for Social Justice

About:

Community Dabke workshop is open to all levels, welcoming participants to experience Palestinian folk dance through communal footwork and specific rhythmic steps. Come experience the collective joy of this form while also learning about and embodying the global momentum of Palestinian life force.

*Karaja’s work is shaped by the rhythms of land, farming, and the communal energy of night weddings, as well as his long experience with El-Funoun Palestinian Dance Troupe. https://www.el-funoun.org

Street Dabka is a project that teaches Palestinian folk dabke through simple, interactive workshops inspired by the atmosphere of weddings and social gatherings. It is a flexible, accessible practice that can happen anywhere — in studios, parks, streets, and public spaces — inviting anyone to join, learn the rhythm, and feel the collective energy of the dance. Learn more at https://www.samerkaraja.com/

Fee: $15 – $25

This activity is made possible by the Bridge Fund for Dance program through the City of Minneapolis Arts & Cultural Affairs Department.

Body Watani Dance Project is a 2025-2027 Company in Residence at MOVO. Funding for this program made possible by the Jerome Foundation.

SHUBBAK : Open Rehearsal
Join us for a window into creative process and conversation about Body Watani’s work: After the Last Red Sky

February 25th 6pm
Located at Red Eye Theater

SHUBBAK // شُبَّاك meaning ‘window’ in Arabic, is an invitation to welcome our community into the creative process of the performance: After the Last Red Sky by Body Watani Dance Project. In this offering we will weave performing excerpts of the work with conversations and discussions about the creative process, stories and contexts embedded in the work.

This activity is made possible by the Bridge Fund for Dance program through the City of Minneapolis Arts & Cultural Affairs Department.
This event is made possible through an artist residency at Red Eye Theater.

tai chi :
sunday afternoon series (6 weeks)
at MOVO | Ivy Building, Minneapolis

Feb 1, 8, 15, 22 2:30-3:30pm
March 1, 8 12:00-1:00pm
Sliding scale: $0-$20

To register, email bodywatani@gmail.com

About:

In these sessions, participants will learn a sequence called Slow Set as it is practiced in the Yang lineage of Tai Chi. Students who commit to the series will receive knowledge and guidance that can / will support them to practice sections of this sequence both inside and outside the class.

Tai Chi is a slow moving, concentrated Chinese martial form that most often is expressed through the study and memorization of flowing, durational movement sequences. The practice can be approached as a gentle, meditative, flowing consisting of following the pathways of a fluid shape and form. It can also be a rigorous, attentive and specific articulation of balance, martial attack and a stimulating expression of elements and animals. Either approach — and everything between — is a meaningful way to encounter this martial art.

In this series you have the agency and invitation to engage physically, mentally, and spiritually within an intensity that is up to you.

This series has been taught in Fall 2025 and will review parts of Slow Set that will learned, but also add onto continue increasing previous knowledge.

We are all, always, beginners.

residencies

2025-2027 | Body Watani is a part of the Company-in-Residence program at MOVO. Funding made possible by the Jerome Foundation | Minneapolis, MN

Image above by Sabrina Hammoudeh