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Image description: Gema Sandoval looks into the distance wearing a green and yellow rebozo over her black top. She is wearing red and gold filigree earrings and is standing in front of a rack full of colorful costumes. Photo by Juan Escobedo.
she/her/hers
Tongva/ Gabrieleno; Los Angeles, CA
Gema Sandoval is devoted to illuminating her Chicano heritage through dance. She creates work that uses her art form, Mexican folk dance, as a vehicle for change in her community. In addition to the traditional regional dances of Mexico, over the past nineteen years, she has staged theme works using the creative tools of her chosen art form: foot work, skirt work, rebozos and Mexican iconography. Examples are: Si Se Puede / Yes You Can, inspired by labor activist and United Farm Workers founder Cesar Chavez. Her rendition of internationally renowned Chicano author, Rudolfo Anaya’s novel Bless Me, Ultima, entitled, Alma Lllanera / Spirit Of The Plains, and Gema’s most recent full evening production, Immigrant Stories, An American Journey.
Currently being planned is a work entitled Mujer Ayer, Hoy Y Siempre/Woman, Yesterday, Today And Always. The inspiration for this production is the choreographer’s deep cultural connection to her roots as it filters through the generations and interacts with the realities of today’s world. At a time when gentrification, pandemic residues, and economic and social inequities prevail, she uses her work to highlight the strengths within communities and becomes a mirror to discrimination in order to help bring about change.
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