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Ni'Ja Whitson
Ni'Ja Whitson is an interdisciplinary artist, performer, writer and the founder/artistic director of The NWA Project. Whitson is gender nonconforming and use the pronouns they/them.

Career
An award-winning interdisciplinary artist, performer and writer, Ni’Ja Whitson has been referred to as “majestic” and “magnetic” by the New York Times, and is recognized by Brooklyn Magazine as being one of the 100 culture influencers. Recent awards include a Hedgebrook Residency, LMCC Process Space Residency, Bogliasco Fellowship, Brooklyn Arts Exchange Artist Residency, two-time Creative Capital "On Our Radar" award including being an inaugural recipient, among many other recognitions across disciplines.

Whitson is a practitioner of African and Diasporic ritual and resistance forms and creates work that reflects the sacred in street, conceptual and interdisciplinary performance. Their work integrates postmodern and African Diasporic performance practices, through the intersections of gender, sexuality, race and spirit. Creative projects include collaborations in theater, dance, music and visual arts with a variety of artists including Sharon Bridgforth, Marjani Forté-Saunders, Baba Israel, La Pocha Nostra, and Merián Soto.

An accomplished improviser and noted for their innovative practice within the Theatrical Jazz Aesthetic, Whitson has collaborated and performed nationally with Douglas Ewart of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, Oliver Lake, JD Parran, Matt Shipp, Edward Wilkerson Jr., Mankwe Ndosi, Tatsu Aoki, and Joseph Jarmon.

As a choreographer, director and dramaturge, they have worked for Nia Witherspoon’s Messiah Complex, and Susan Watson-Turner’s Anon(ymous), both of which received New York audience and ensemble awards. They have also worked as an independent choreographer alongside Dianne McIntyre on the 10-year anniversary revival of Crowns written and directed by Regina Taylor at the Goodman Theatre.

Commissions and residencies include the Lost and Found / Platform Festival (2016), Endless Shout, curated by George Lewis , Vision Festival, PRELUDE festival, and Harlem Stage. Whitson's evening-length work, A Meditation on Tongues, premiered at the American Realness festival. They are on faculty at The New School for the Liberal Arts, and is the founder/artistic director of The NWA Project.

Other recognition and awards include residencies with Movement Research, Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance, Kennedy Center, The American College Theatre Festival Outstanding Ensemble Award, Downtown Urban Theatre Festival Audience Award, Vermont Studio Center Writing Residency, the inaugural LinkUp Artist in Residence, Chicago DanceBridge Residency, John G. Curtis Jr. Prize, Archibald Motley Grant, and a 3Arts Visual Artist Award Nomination. They received a BA from Oberlin College and a MFA Fellowship Award from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Works

 * A Meditation on Tongues (2017)
 * Quasar (2015)
 * Summons and Arrival (2015)
 * Tribute to Malachi Maghostut Favors (2015)
 * When Water Dries the Mouth (2015)