boikutt (Composer)

 

Boikutt is a music composer, sound artist, and MC based in Ramallah, Palestine. Creating sounds using sampled material, field recordings, and electronic devices, the results range between hip-hop, downtempo, glitch, ambient and experimental. He has composed and produced music for artists such as Kronos Quartet, Bukue One, Spiritchild, Tamer Abu-Ghazaleh and others, and has appeared as an MC on albums for artists such as Heliodrome, Slovo, Bonnot, and Lethal Skillz to name a few. Co-founder of the Ramallah Underground Collective which has toured across the Arab World, Europe, and Australia, Boikutt is also co-founder and member of audio-visual group Tashweesh, with whom he is currently touring. He has produced and exhibited a few sound art pieces, composed several international and local film scores, and is now working on different collaborative and solo projects.

Michael Berberock (Composer, Sound Designer)

 

Michael is from Scranton, PA, graduated from Fordham University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communications, and is currently the owner of Berberock Records and Head of the Music Division for Mind the Art Entertainment. In May of 2008 Mike produced his first solo rap album, Scranton Gangster, and is currently working with co-producer Tijuan Aikens on his sophmore album, Pardon the Languish. Mike began collaborating on sound design with YSDT in 2009 for the production of The Store, which includes two of his original music tracks. Additional sound design credits include arrangements for the film/web series: Wunderkind, Arranged, Zack and Michael, and Hope Against Hope (UK television pilot); and for such theater productions as: May-December with the Nose & Clammy (2009 Fringe Festival, NYC), Dear America, (2006 Fringe Festival, NYC), Back Burner Murder (Six Figures Theatre Company’s Artists of Tomorrow Festival), Rising Circle Presents: The American Family Project, September 12th, Leashed, Jarvis Black, and Harpo the Great. Berberich has also done voice over work for the company, and records, mixes and produces sound scores in his private studio in Bed Stuy, Brooklyn.

Emma Hoette (Costume Designer)

 

Emma is originally from Australia,  is a trained dancer that became intrigued by the expressive and unique qualities of clothing.  As she continued to dance and perform, she developed an understanding and sensitivity of how clothing can make a dancer feel and the power that is has to enhance and supplement the choreographers’ concepts. While dancing with Byron School of Dance and Imprint Dance Company in Australia, The Next Stage Project in Amsterdam, and in NYC, and performing works by Keely Garfield, Ishmael Houston Jones, Rebecca Stenn and Eric Jackson Bradley  she has combined her passion and talent for dance and costume design.  Since moving to NYC Emma has designed for works of Ishmael Houston Jones, Eric Jackson Bradley, Max Stone, The Next Stage Project, Diana McCarthy,Yaa Samar! Dance Theatre, and Ashleigh Leite.

Riham Isaac (Actress)

Holds a Bachelor’s degree of Physiotherapy from the Arab American University in Jenin. Riham worked with different theatres in Palestine and internationally including Alharah Theatre, Ashtar Theatre (Palestine), Bread and Puppet (USA) and the National Theatre of Scotland. Her short-film On the Heel Side was selected for the Toronto Palestine Film Festival. She is currently on tour with 48 minutes for Palestine.

Yuriy Nayer (Lighting Design)

 

Yuriy Nayer (Lighting Designer) was born in Belarus, but has proudly called New York his home for the last 14 years. International Credits: The Store, with YaaSamar! (Jordan, Palestine, Israel); Anjou, the musical (Korea, China, Mexico). Select New York Credits: Bridgeboy (The Active Theatre); The Mire and With Aaron’s Arms Around Me (Negro Ensemble Company/ Cherry Lane Theatre); I Stand Before You Naked by Joyce Carol Oates, a staged reading to benefit Safe Horizon (Gerald W. Lynch Theatre); Being Sellers (59E59/ Brits Off-Broadway); Parenting101, the musical (Emelin Theatre); 348 (Dixon Place); Interchange (The Workshop Theatre); In Loco Parentis (FringeNYC ‘10); Colored People’s Time (NEC/ MITF ’10 Best Lighting Design Award); The Picture of Dorian Gray (Planet Connections Festivity Best Lighting Design Award); Two Rooms (The Active Theatre); The Sandbox (June Havoc Theatre/ MITF’ 09); The Night Watcher (Primary Stages). Other credits: The Runt of the Litter National Tour. Yuriy is very proud of his continued work with YSDT! Other dance collaborators include: Elena Demyanenko, Transcendance Group, BODYART Dance and BALAM Dance. www.yuriynayer.com.

Nolan O’Bryan (Set Design)

 

Born in California, reared in Texas, Nolan O’Bryan is a Brooklyn-based artist, designer, and teacher. He earned his MS from Pratt in 2010 with his work ranging from metal sculpture to media design and is a contributing artist to the annual Crest Fest Art Show in Williamsburg, NY.  During the week, Nolan is an art and design teacher at the Manhattan Business Academy while he uses nights and weekends to cook up hair-brained plots in his underground lair. www.nolanobryan.net

Isabel Asha Penzlien (Photographer)

 

Isabel was born and raised in Hamburg, Germany, and moved to new york to study fine art photography at ICP in 1995. She continues to live and work in new york city, and her work has appeared in various publications, including Catholic, The Guardian, I-D Magazine, Index and Teen Vogue. Over the last few years she has published a series of 8 photography books and her book of photographs ‘No Things’ was published by Forthysian Press. In late 2009 she established ‘Portraits by Isabel’. ‘Music Students’ her newest book was published in the Fall of 2010. www.portraitsbyisabel.com

David Prete (Drama Coach)

 

David Prete is a writer, actor and director from New York City Currently pursuing his MFA in Directing at Northwestern University. He graduated from the New Actors Workshop where he studied with Mike Nichols (Tony and Academy Award winning director of The Graduate. Primary Colors, The Birdcage, Angels in America), and George Morrison (Broadway and Off-Broadway director of The Premise and Epitaph for George Dillon), who also taught Dustin Hoffman, Edie Falco, Gene Hackman, Wesley Snipes, and others.  David Prete co-starred in the world premiere of the Off-Broadway play On The Line at the Cherry Lane Theater.  He has appeared in theatre productions ranging from Shakespeare to adaptations of Leo Tolstoy andcommedia dell’arte versions of Clifford Odets. He co-founded Water Theatre Company where he worked as an actor and producer. He has also acted in independent films screened at the Santa Barbara Film Festival, the Long Island Film Festival, and the International Film Festival of NYC. He teaches writers to read their work in front of audiences through classes taught one-on-one, in small groups, or at conferences and schools around the country, including agraduate course at The New School in New York City called “The Art of Public Readings.”  His first book, Say That to My Face was published by W.W. Norton. He is currently at work on a novel entitled, August and then some, also to be published by Norton.  www.davidprete.com