In January 2021 within the safety of a Works & Process bubble residency at Bethany Arts Community, the Ladies of Hip-Hop gathered a group of eleven major practitioners including dance elders (ages 50–60), innovators (ages 33–49), and young celebrants (ages 20–32) to support and facilitate the much-needed exchange of inspiration and the transference of knowledge between generations. Led by Executive Director Michele Byrd-McPhee and Trustee LaTasha Barnes, this intersectional project incubated and captured the knowledge, beauty, and power of Black female street dancers and resulted in a rare indoor video performance, commissioned by Works & Process at the Guggenheim, and co-produced by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts and New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

As the Ladies of Hip-Hop look beyond the traditional lens of exposure for Black bodies in dance, which has overwhelmingly focused on Eurocentric dance aesthetics including modern, contemporary, and ballet, together again Works & Process and Bethany Arts Community will provide a LaunchPAD “Process as Destination” residency from March 15 through March 25, 2022, with an in-process showing for the local community. For more information, visit bethanyarts.org. The Ladies of Hip-Hop will reconvene and create a concert dance piece for premiere at the Peter B. Lewis Theater at the Guggenheim Museum on March 27. This commission will preserve and celebrate the beauty, strength, and lived experiences of Black women in street dance. Alongside the premiere, Linda Murray, Curator, Jerome Robbins Dance Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, moderates a discussion with Byrd-McPhee, who along with Barnes are artists-in-residence currently working on the Dance Division’s long-standing Dance Oral History Project.

This world premiere is co-commissioned by Works & Process at the Guggenheim and Bethany Arts Community. The Ladies of Hip-Hop’s Works & Process bubble residency and Works & Process LaunchPAD residency is hosted by Bethany Arts Community. Works & Process bubble residencies were made possible by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.

Ladies of Hip-Hop Dance Collective is supported by the 2021–2022 Choreographers in Residence Program at County Prep High School in Jersey City, New Jersey. For more information, visit countyprepdance.org.