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Image description: iele paloumpis, a white genderqueer person with dark curls and eyes, looks directly and confidently at the camera. They wear square gold-rimmed glasses, a bold, two-toned lip in red and hot pink, and a shirt emblazoned with images of clouds and wheat, created by Indigenous-American designer Noel Bennetto. In the background, iele’s textile studio displays weavings and embroidered tapestries in warm, rich tones. Photo by Lily Olsen.
they/them
Lenapehoking, Canarsie/Munsee territories; Brooklyn, NY
iele paloumpis is a choreographer, herbalist, educator and textile artist. Their work is rooted in disability justice, trauma-informed griefwork and ancestral re-membrance practices. iele comes from a long line of mystics and embodies fragmented lineages across queer, trans and crip aural histories, alongside their Greek, Anatolian and Irish diasporic bloodlines.
iele’s choreographic works have been presented through Brooklyn Arts Exchange, New York Live Arts, Dixon Place, Painted Bride Art Center, Franklin Street Works, and Movement Research at Judson, among others. iele’s most recent work In place of catastrophe, a clear night sky premiered at Danspace Project in May 2022. The piece explored intergenerational trauma and resilience and de-centered sight as a primary mode of experiencing dance. iele has also been a resident artist at Zil Culture Center in Moscow and was selected to participate in a Teachers Teaching Teachers exchange between Movement Research faculty and the Workshop Foundation in Budapest.
iele is grateful to have learned from many collaborators and teachers who have influenced their path. This lineage includes co-creating with Marýa Wethers, Marielys Burgos Meléndez, M. Rodriguez, Seta Morton, Ogemdi Ude, Krishna Washburn, and Alejandra Ospina; being shaped by many artists within NYC’s dance community; building a relationship with plants through the teachings of Rosemary Gladstar; deepening into ancestral plant medicine across the Mediterranean & SWANA regions with Layla K. Feghali & SWANA Ancestral; becoming an end of life doula under the mentorship of Deanna Flores Cochran; studying dance at Hollins University with Donna Faye Burchfield and Jeffery Bullock; and channeling embroidery from the ancestors who have been teachers in guiding iele’s hands.
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