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Continuing its 17th season, Red Clay Dance Company is thrilled to announce the return of its La Femme Dance Festival during Women's History Month, March 26-28, 2026, with a one-night-only performance at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance (205 E. Randolph Street) on Saturday, March 28 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets to the performance are now on sale for $19-$59 at redclaydance.com.

In a cultural moment calling for equity, representation and the amplification of diverse voices, La Femme Dance Festival rises as a powerful tribute to the brilliance, resilience and global impact of Black women in dance. Now in its 5th year, this biennial festival curated by Red Clay Dance Company's Founding Artistic Director and CEO Vershawn Sanders-Ward is a national platform for choreographic excellence rooted in the Black/African Diaspora.

The Harris Theater performance on March 28 features the Chicago debut of viral tap dance sensation Syncopated Ladies, led by Emmy Award-nominated tap dancer and choreographer Chloé Arnold, whose recent work includes over 70 episodes of The Late Late Show with James Corden, choreography for Jerry Seinfeld's Unfrosted for Netflix, and the Apple TV+ musical film Spirited starring Will Ferrell, Ryan Reynolds and Octavia Spencer.

The festival performance also includes the world premiere of choreographer Rena Butler's A SEAT (working title) for Red Clay Dance Company, along with a reprise of two celebrated works by Founding Artistic Director and CEO Vershawn Sanders-Ward: Unconditional Conditions, which premiered at the 2024 La Femme Dance Festival, and Love Letters to CHI-IL. The performance also features a guest appearance from South Chicago Dance Theatre, which will perform an excerpt of choreographer Kia S. Smith's Memoirs of Jazz in the Alley, which premiered at the Auditorium Theatre in 2023.

"To say I'm excited about the fifth edition of the La Femme Dance Festival is an understatement—what began over a decade ago at the Park District's Fuller Park Auditorium as a way to honor Women's Herstory Month and uplift artists I admired has grown into something far bigger than I ever imagined," says Red Clay Dance Company's Founding Artistic Director and CEO Vershawn Sanders-Ward. "This year's festival places Chicago artists on a global stage, featuring an unmatched roster of choreographers whose glocal practices are deeply rooted here while resonating around the world. I can't wait for Chicago audiences and those traveling in for the festival to witness the brilliance, power, and magnificence of Black women creatives on full display."

La Femme Dance Festival programming kicks off with an Artivist Table Brunch on Thursday, March 26 from 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m. (featured speakers and location to be announced) and a dance master class for professional dancers at Red Clay Dance Center (808 E. 63rd Street) on Friday, March 27 with Rena Butler. Advance registration is required.

The day after the festival, Red Clay Dance Center will host Chloé Arnold's Syncopated Ladies Empowerment Camp on Sunday, March 29 from 11 a.m.–5 p.m., welcoming dancers of all ages and levels for classes in tap dance, Brazilian dance, Afro funk, hip-hop and empowerment. The camp is presented by the Chloé and Maud Foundation in partnership with Red Clay Dance Company. Registration for the camp is $200 per student.

For more information about Red Clay Dance Company's La Femme Dance Festival and tickets to all festival programs, visit redclaydance.com. 

Artist Bios

Vershawn Sanders-Ward is a visionary director, choreographer, educator, and Artivist transforming the landscape of contemporary dance through bold artistry and activism. As the Founding Artistic Director and CEO of Red Clay Dance Company, she seamlessly blends African diasporic dance forms with modern techniques to create powerful, socially engaged performances that inspire dialogue and catalyze change. A lifelong advocate for community empowerment, Vershawn uses dance as a platform to examine identity, race, justice, and collective healing.

Her work has earned national and international recognition, including the inaugural Walder Platform Award, a Dance/USA Artist Fellowship, the Chicago Dancemakers Forum Award, and a 3Arts Award. Most recently, her choreography premiered at two prestigious dance institutions—Jacob's Pillow and The Yard at Martha's Vineyard—further solidifying her influence within the global dance community. Her choreography has also been featured at esteemed institutions such as Northwestern University and Loyola University Chicago, with commissions extending across the United States and internationally.

An accomplished educator, Vershawn holds an MFA in Dance from New York University and a BFA from Columbia College Chicago.  Beyond the stage and studio, she is a Board Trustee for Dance/USA, a Community Impact Fellow with the Harvard Business School Club, and a featured guest on PBS's The Expressway with Dulé Hill. Through every facet of her work, Vershawn Sanders-Ward continues to champion equity, inclusion, and transformative cultural expression.

Chloé Arnold is an Emmy-nominated Choreographer and Tap Dancer, discovered at a young age in Washington, DC, by Debbie Allen. Chloé's choreography has been featured on numerous hit TV shows, including over 70 episodes of The Late Late Show with James Corden, featuring A-list actors from Will Smith and Hugh Jackman to pop superstars Ariana Grande and BTS. Other choreography credits include: Bel Air, So You Think You Can Dance, Good Morning America, The Ellen Show, The Talk, A Black Lady Sketch Show, Hello, Jack!, History of the World Part II, and John Legend and Chrissy Teigen's A Legendary Christmas. Chloe most recently choreographed Jerry Seinfeld's Unfrosted for Netflix and the Apple TV+ musical film Spirited starring Will Ferrell, Ryan Reynolds, and Octavia Spencer.

Chloé is widely known as the Founder of the female tap dance band, Syncopated Ladies, whose fierce footwork and feminine style have attracted audiences of all ages around the world and have over 200 million views online. In addition to their own sold-out concert tours, other live performance credits include: CNN's New Year's Eve Live, Mariah Carey's Merry Christmas to All at Madison Square Garden, The Kelly Clarkson Show, Good Morning America, Global Citizen Week, New York Fashion Week, Essence Fest, Imagine Justice (featuring Common, J. Cole, and Andra Day), Glamour Women of the Year Awards, Billie Jean King Leadership Initiative at the US Open, JP Morgan Chase Women on the Move at Radio City Musical Hall, CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, Women in the World Summit at Lincoln Center, Democratic National Convention and many more.

Chloé is one of 2024 Ebony Power 100 honorees, was named one of LeBron James' "The Strongest," a campaign featured in Essence to celebrate his 16th Nike Sneaker release, was on The Root 100 List, and she was featured in Shonda Rhimes and Microsoft's "Language of Leadership" panel discussion. Chloe is also an entrepreneur, investor, and philanthropist who holds a degree in Film from Columbia University. She and her sister Maud produced the award-winning documentary Tap World, are the co-directors of the critically acclaimed DC Tap Festival, and co-produce the Hollywood Tap Festival with Debbie Allen and the Debbie Allen Dance Academy. They have been recognized by Columbia University as Rising Stars, by the US House of Representatives as arts preservers and ambassadors and won the 33rd Annual Mayor's Arts Award for Excellence in Performing Arts. Through the Chloé and Maud Foundation, they give back to the community by creating equal opportunity access to dance programming and education for underserved communities with after-school programs in South Central LA, and Favelas in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil.

Rena Butler, a Chicago native, trained at The Chicago Academy for the Arts, Taipei National University of the Arts, and earned her BFA from SUNY Purchase. She has performed with acclaimed companies such as Hubbard Street Dance Chicago (also a Choreographic Fellow), AIM by Kyle Abraham, Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company, and Gibney Company (also the inaugural Choreographic Associate). A 2019 Princess Grace Award winner, recipient of the 2024 Isadora Duncan Dance Award, and the 2025 Ferradini Grander Award in Italy, Butler has created works for Het Nationale Ballet, National Ballet of Canada, San Francisco Opera, The Lyric Opera of Chicago, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Cincinnati Ballet, Gauthier Dance Juniors in Stuttgart, Ailey II, AIM By Kyle Abraham, Beth Morrison Projects at BAM Harvey with Matthew Ozawa and Huang Rou and more. Her choreography spans opera, ballet, film, and museums across the U.S. and Europe. A passionate educator and mentor, she has taught at Juilliard, Jacob's Pillow, The Lines Training Program, and SUNY Purchase, and co-founded DanceLab, a free creators' program for the Chicago youth. Featured on the cover of Dance Magazine in the US and Tanz Zeitschrift in Germany, Butler continues to lead in contemporary dance through her creations and commissions.

Kia S. Smith is a Chicago native and the Founder, Director of Vision and Strategy, and Resident Choreographer for South Chicago Dance Theatre. She is also the founder of the signature core programs, the Associate and Emerging Artist Program, South Chicago Dance Festival, the Choreographic Diplomacy™ Program, Education and Community Programs, the Therapeutic Dance initiative, and Workforce Development program. Her early training included Hyde Park School of Dance, The Joel Hall Dance Center, ETA Creative Arts Foundation, StoryCatchers Theatre, and the American Dance Festival. She holds a BFA in Dance from Western Michigan University and an MFA from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where she was an Advanced Opportunity Program Fellow. As a freelance choreographer, Kia's recent and upcoming commissions include Madison Ballet (2021), Chicago Repertory Ballet (2022), Houston Contemporary Dance Company (2023), Chicago Opera Theater (2023), Ruth Page Civic Ballet Training Company (2022), University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (2023), Giordano Dance Chicago (2023), Western Michigan University (2023), Southeast Missouri State University (2024), Opera Laguna (2024, 2025), New Dance Partners (2024), Resilience Dance Company (2024), Columbia College Chicago (2024) and Scottish Ballet School (2025). Kia's first evening-length work, Memoirs of Jazz in the Alley for South Chicago Dance Theatre, premiered at the Auditorium Theater of Chicago in 2023.

Kia is a member of the International Association of Blacks in Dance, where she received the Joan Myers Brown Artist Development Fund scholarship in 2018. In 2021, she was a 3Arts Make A Wave awardee and an Ann & Weston Hicks Choreographic Fellow at the renowned Jacobs Pillow. She was a 2022 Chicago Dancemakers Forum Lab Artist and a participant in the Artist in Residence "AIR" Program at the Cliff Dwellers Chicago. Kia was named a Rising Star in 2023 by Chicago Magazine, Player of the Moment in the category of Dance for Newcity Magazine's annual 50 Players List in 2023, and one of Dance Magazine's 25 to Watch for 2024. WBEZ named Kia a breakout artist for 2024, and Chicago News Weekly designated Kia "one of the fastest rising stars of the dance world today."

About Red Clay Dance Company

Led by Founding Artistic Director and CEO Vershawn Sanders-Ward, Red Clay Dance Company is a Black women-led, Black-benefiting professional dance organization that moves the world through Artivism—the integration of art and activism to inspire social transformation. Rooted in the dances, histories, and movement technologies of the African Diaspora, Red Clay Dance creates, performs, and teaches work that uplifts Black voices, dismantles systemic inequities, and cultivates collective joy and liberation.

At the heart of the organization is our professional touring company, Red Clay Dance, Chicago's premier Afro-Contemporary dance ensemble. Now in its 17th season, this award-winning company serves as the artistic engine of Red Clay Dance Company, touring locally, nationally and internationally to share stories of the African Diaspora that challenge oppression, celebrate identity, and ignite agency. Red Clay Dance has graced renowned stages such as Jacob's Pillow, The Yard, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Harris Theater for Music & Dance, the Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago, the DuSable Museum of African American History, ODC Theater, Dance Mission Theater, The Painted Bride Art Center, and the National Theatre of Uganda. Through technically rigorous and culturally grounded performance, the company affirms African-rooted forms as powerful and enduring modes of innovation, expression, and resistance. 

The touring company's artistic excellence informs our education and community engagement programs, including Making the Artivist Apprenticeship and School/Community Education Partnerships, reaching more than 2,500 students and 4,000 families annually. From our home—the Red Clay Dance Center in Chicago's historic Woodlawn neighborhood—we provide access to high-quality dance training, mentorship, and professional development for artists and community members through our classes and In the Making Membership. Together, our ecosystem of touring, teaching, and training sustains a vibrant hub for Glocal Artivism—proving that dance is not just performance, but a pathway to equity, empowerment, and lasting change.

The Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago announces 16 by Red Clay Dance Company for three performances only, April 17-19, 2025, featuring Founding Artistic Director and CEO Vershawn Sanders-Ward (‘02)’s new staging of Written on the Flesh and a premiere by Bebe Miller—commissioned and set on Red Clay Dance Company dancers including Columbia alumni Amaya Arroyo (‘23) and Celeste Brace (‘23).

For more information and to purchase tickets, visit dance.colum.edu/events/2025/4/17/red-clay-dance-company.

Season 51 welcomes the return to the Dance Center of two extraordinary dance artists who have significantly impacted the dance ecosystem in Chicago and beyond—Bebe Miller and Vershawn Sanders-Ward. New York- and Ohio-based Miller was dubbed a “MoMing Sensation” by the Chicago Tribune in 1986 when she first performed in Chicago at MoMing Dance and Arts Center. Miller made her Dance Center debut at the original Uptown location in 1990 as part of Present Vision/Past Voice – The African American Tradition in Modern Dance series and returned in 1999 for the Changing Channels Festival where then-undergraduate Vershawn Sanders-Ward first experienced her work. From 2005 through 2020, the Dance Center, the Museum of Contemporary Art, and Links Hall all presented Miller in Chicago. Sanders-Ward founded Red Clay Dance Company in Chicago in 2009 and began making a local, national and international name for herself. Sanders-Ward returned to her alma mater for Red Clay Dance Company’s collaboration with Uganda-based Keiga Dance Company in 2018. During the pandemic, the South Loop Spark Plug incubator residency at the Dance Center commissioned four Chicago-based choreographers, including Sanders-Ward, to premiere new works in 2022 that were developed over a 6-month period with Miller serving as an artistic process mentor. 16 is the latest opportunity for Chicago to experience these two artists at the Dance Center.

“Vershawn Sanders-Ward and Bebe Miller are shining examples of continued, never-ending dedication to the field, to process, to inquiry, to continuing to investigate,” says Dance Center Artistic Director Meredith Sutton.

Tickets for Red Clay Dance Company’s 16 at the Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago (1306 S. Michigan Avenue, Chicago) are now available for $30, with non-Columbia student tickets available for $10. Performances are Thursday, April 17 at 7:30 p.m. (includes post-performance Q&A with Bebe Miller and Vershawn Sanders-Ward); Friday, April 18 at 7:30 p.m.; and Saturday, April 19 at 7:30 p.m. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit dance.colum.edu/events/2025/4/17/red-clay-dance-company.

Displayed int he lobby will be an archive of Red Clay Dance Company’s16 years in partnership with the Chicago Dance History Project for audiences to view before the show and during intermission.

Alongside the performances, advanced/professional dancers and students can take a masterclass with Bebe Miller at Red Clay Dance Company (808 E. 63rd Street, Chicago) on Thursday, April 17. Tickets are available for $30 HERE. A workshop with Vershawn Sanders-Ward will also be held at the Dance Center at Columbia College Chicago (1306 S. Michigan Avenue, Chicago) on Friday, March 7 at 10:30 a.m.

When Written on the Flesh first premiered in 2016 at Chicago’s DuSable Black History Museum and Education Center, it had been sparked by a Ta-Nehisi Coates’ 2014 essay in The Atlantic where he wrote: “elegant racism is invisible, supple, and enduring.” In developing the dance work, Vershawn Sanders-Ward and the Red Clay Dance Company dancers were struck by how memories of direct, in-your-face bigotry were easy to call up and respond to, “But some of the underpinnings of the things that we just move through in our lives become a way of living,” says Sanders-Ward. “They are actually invisibilized. I was intrigued about how to make those things visible.”

This 2025 restaging takes the inquiry deeper, drawing additional inspiration from Isabel Wilkerson’s 2020 book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents: “As we go about our daily lives, caste is the wordless usher in a darkened theater, flashlight cast down in the aisles, guiding us to our assigned seats for a performance. The hierarchy of caste is not about feelings or morality. It is about power—which groups have it and which do not.” Reimagining the work with the current dancers in the company, Sanders-Ward seeks to confront systemic racial inequities while searching for resilience, forgiveness, and love.

“There are systemic issues that we still don’t have the courage to really lay bare,” says Sanders-Ward. “Even when it’s bubbling up there’s still this powerful dynamic to suppress and suppress and suppress, not let’s address it head on no matter how disruptive it’s going to be. We see pockets of it. But are we willing to let it all come out?”

“The relationships that I have now in the field are because of the time that I was at the Dance Center and the generosity of the faculty in making connections for me,” says Sanders-Ward. “I feel very blessed to be in a position to put the dancers in the company in relationship with Bebe Miller, an artist who is just legendary to me, but is also still on her own creative journey.” says Sanders-Ward. “It’s a homecoming to be able to be incubated in a space and go away and to come back at this pivotal moment.”

About 16’s Choreographers

A native New Yorker, Bebe Miller first performed her choreography at NYC’s Dance Theater Workshop in 1978. She formed Bebe Miller Company in 1985 to pursue her interest in finding a physical language for the human condition. Committed to keeping dance available to a wide spectrum of people and to further the conversation about the role of arts and creativity in our culture, Miller is dedicated to providing access to the creative process and expression to diverse communities. She has created more than 50 dance works for the company and has been commissioned and presented by 651 ARTS, BAM Next Wave, DTW, Jacob’s Pillow, Joyce Theater, PICA, REDCAT, Walker Art Center, and Wexner Center for the Arts among others. Her choreography has been performed by Kyle Abraham’s A.I.M. (Abraham In Motion), Dayton Contemporary Dance Company, Oregon Ballet Theater, Boston Ballet, Philadanco, Salt Lake City’s Repertory Dance Theater, the UK’s Phoenix Dance Company, PACT Dance Company of Johannesburg, South Africa, and at a host of colleges and universities including the Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago. Named a Master of African AmericanChoreography by the Kennedy Center in 2005, Bebe has been a Movement Research honoree, has received four New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” awards, the David R. White Award from New York Live Arts, United States Artists and Guggenheim Fellowships, honorary doctorates from Ursinus College and Franklin & Marshall College, and is one of the inaugural class of Doris Duke Artist Award recipients. Bebe is a Distinguished Professor Emerita in The Ohio State University’s Department of Dance and lives in Columbus, OH. bebemillercompany.org

The Founding Artistic Director& CEO of Red Clay Dance Company, Vershawn Sanders-Ward blends elements of African diasporic dance forms with modern techniques and is committed to reshaping the landscape of contemporary dance while driving social change. Through Red Clay Dance Company, she provides a platform for artists of diverse backgrounds to explore issues of identity, race, and social justice through dance and ARTIVISM. Her work has been presented in Chicago, New York, San Francisco, The Yard at Martha’s Vineyard, and internationally in Toronto, Dakar and Kampala and commissioned by Columbia College Chicago, Northwestern University, Knox College, AS220, and the National Theatre in Uganda. On the Board of Trustees for Dance/USA, Sanders-Ward is President of the Board of Directors for the Black Arts & Cultural Alliance of Chicago, was selected as a Community Impact Fellow for the Harvard Business School Club of Chicago and as a member of the inaugural Obama Foundation Summit for Emerging Global Leaders. She is the recipient of the inaugural Walder Foundation Platform Award, Dance/USA Artist Fellowship, Dance/USA Leadership Fellowship, Chicago Dancemakers Forum Award, and 3Arts Award. She was featured on the 2024 Chicago episode of the PBS series "The Expressway with Dulé Hill, "named a 2024 Chicagoan of the Year by the Chicago Tribune, and inducted into Newcity’s “Players 50: People Who Really Perform for Chicago” Hall of Fame in 2023. Sanders-Ward is a candidate for Dunham Certification and currently serves on faculty at Loyola University of Chicago. She holds an MFA in Dance from New York University and is the first recipient of a BFA in Dance from  Columbia College Chicago, where she was a Gates Millennium Scholar. redclaydance.com

About Red Clay Dance Company

Red Clay Dance Company, Chicago’s premier Afro-contemporary dance company, is the brainchild of Vershawn Sanders-Ward, the institutions’ Founding Artistic Director & CEO. The touring company is an award-winning ensemble of versatile and dynamic dance Artivists that tour and perform locally, nationally, and internationally. In its 16-year history the company has toured and performed in venues such as the Harris Theater for Music & Dance, Dance Center of Columbia College, the DuSable Museum Roundhouse, the Museum of Contemporary Art, ODC Theater, Dance Mission Theater, The Painted Bride, Joyce Soho, and the National Theater of Uganda. Committed to taking their signature Artivism in Motion from the stage into learning environments, its community engagement work is a vital part of the company’s creative process and village building work.

About The Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago

Within the School of Theatre and Dance, the Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago is home to the Dance program and the Dance Presenting Series. Valuing embodied human expression, nurturing an expansive understanding of dance from the established to the experimental, and centering pluralism, the Dance Center aims to be a nucleus for innovation and creativity—on stage, in the classroom, and beyond. By partnering with local, national, and international dance artists dedicated to transforming the field, the Dance Presenting Series offers live performances and other shared opportunities for students, faculty, artists, and audiences to connect, witness, research, experiment, practice, imagine, and grow. We cultivate an environment and culture that prioritizes respect for self and others, and advances an anti-racist, equitable, and just society.

Season 51 is supported in part by Alphawood Foundation, Chicago International Puppet Theatre Festival, City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, Illinois Arts Council, Kalapriya Center for Indian Arts, National Endowment for the Arts, Red Clay Dance Company, and The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation. Additional support for She’s Auspicious is provided by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

About Columbia College Chicago

Located in the heart of downtown Chicago’s Cultural Mile, Columbia College Chicago is a private, nonprofit college offering a distinctive curriculum that blends creative and media arts, liberal arts, and business for nearly 6,700 students in more than 60 undergraduate and graduate degree programs. Dedicated to academic excellence and long-term career success, Columbia College Chicago creates a dynamic, challenging, and collaborative space for students who see the world through a creative lens.