Rosy Simas is a transdisciplinary artist who historically has presented work as a choreographer.
Simas is Haudenosaunee, enrolled Seneca, Heron Clan. “The culture, history, and identity stored in my body is the underpinning of all my artwork. Creating is a spiritual act for me, rooted in nature, formed through my link to my ancestors and the land of which we are made.”
Simas’ projects merge decolonized physical movement with media, sound, and objects for stage and installation. She unites cultural concepts and images with scientific and philosophical theories to create work that is literal, abstract, and metaphoric. Her work weaves themes of personal and collective identity with family, matriarchy, sovereignty, equality, and healing. She creates dance work with a team of Native artists and artists of color, driven by movement-vocabularies developed through deep listening.
Simas is a recipient of a Dance/USA Fellowship, Joyce Award from The Joyce Foundation, McKnight Fellowship for Choreography, Guggenheim Creative Arts Fellowship, First People Fund Fellowship, and a Native Arts and Cultures Foundation Fellowship.
Her dance works include “Weave,” “Skin(s)” and “We Wait In The Darkness” which have toured Turtle Island and France with the support of NEFA National Dance Project, MAP Fund, and National Performance Network.
Her dance, film and sculpture work-in-progress “she who lives on the road to war” is currently on exhibit and being rehearsed live at the Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis.
Simas recently co-edited the first Indigenous issue of the Movement Research Performance Journal, Sovereign Movements, issue 52/53.