co-artistic directors
© Mario Sorrenti / Art Partner
Okwui Okpokwasili (she/her) is a Brooklyn-based performer, choreographer and writer creating multidisciplinary performance pieces. The child of immigrants from Nigeria, Okpokwasili was born and raised in the Bronx, and the histories of these places and the girls and women who inhabit them feature prominently in much of her work. Her highly experimental productions include "Bessie" Award-winning pent-up: a revenge dance, "Bessie" Award-winning Bronx Gothic, as well as poor people's TV room, poor people's TV room (SOLO), when I return who will receive me, Adaku's revolt, and the participatory performance installation Sitting on a Man’s Head. In 2022, she was the inaugural artist for the Kravis Studio Residency program at MoMA. She is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships, including a 2018 Princeton University Hodder Fellowship, a 2018 Herb Alpert Award in Dance, a 2018 Doris Duke Artist Award, and a 2018 MacArthur Fellowship.
Peter Born (he/him) works as a director, composer and designer of performance and installation, often in collaboration with Okwui Okpokwasili. Their work has appeared internationally at the Berlin Biennale, the Wiener Festwochen, and the Tate. He collaborated with David Thomson as a director, designer and writer on The Venus Knot (2017), he his own mythical beast (2018), and VESSEL (2022). As a set designer, he collaborated with Nora Chipaumire on rite/riot (2014) and El Capitan Kinglady (2016). Four of Peter’s collaborations have garnered New York Dance Performance “Bessie” Awards. His work poor people’s TV room solo installation, created in collaboration with Okwui Okpokwasili, is in the collections of the Hammer Museum and the Whitney Museum. His work as an art director and prop stylist has been featured in video and photo projects with Vogue, Estee Lauder, The Wall Street Journal, and other publications.
company producer
© Lauren Eliot
Annabel Heacock (they/she) is a theatre director, deviser, producer, and arts administrator. Prior to joining the Sweat Variant team, they worked at Roundabout Theatre Company for three years, supporting the work of playwrights and emerging directors and producing new play readings as the Artistic Programs Manager. In her own creative work, Annabel recently directed here i fall up by Beth Golison at the New Ohio Theatre's Ice Factory Festival and As I Was, Not As I Am by August Hakvaag at WP Theater for Moxie Arts NY. In addition to their work on new plays and musicals, Annabel has directed puppetry and toy theatre performances, as well as immersive spectacles in public spaces. They are currently adapting the short story “The Breakfast” by Amparo Dávila with playwright/director Valen-Marie Santos, with support from a residency with Fresh Ground Pepper at Little Pond Arts Retreat. Annabel is an alum of Northwestern University and Studio Theatre's directing apprenticeship in Washington, D.C. They have assistant directed for Whitney White, Henry Godinez, Joanie Schultz, Reginald Douglas, and David Muse.
studio and initiatives manager
© Elliott Jerome Brown Jr.
Kearra Amaya Gopee (they/them) is an anti-disciplinary visual artist and facilitator from Carapichaima, Kairi (the larger of the twin-island nation known as Trinidad and Tobago), living on Lenape land (New York). Using video, sculpture, sound, writing, and other media, they identify both violence and time as primary conditions that undergird the anti-Black world in which they work: a world that they are intent on working against through myriad collective interventions. Their work has been exhibited at venues such as documenta15, The Kitchen, White Columns, and at film festivals internationally. They have been awarded fellowships at MacDowell, the Leslie Lohman Museum, Queer|Art, and the Global Fund for Women. In 2024, they will be in residence at the International Studio and Curatorial Program as well as Headlands Center for the Arts. Previously, they have participated in residencies at Skowhegan, Red Bull Arts Detroit, and NLS Kingston in Jamaica, among others. They have guest lectured at Emory University, Rutgers University, and the Caltech-Huntington Program in Visual Culture. Gopee was an Elaine G. Weitzen ISP Studio Program Fellow at the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program in 2024. They hold an MFA from UCLA with a concentration in Interdisciplinary Studio and a BFA in Photography and Imaging from New York University. They have been developing an artist residency and research platform titled a small place, after Jamaica Kincaid's book of the same name. Gopee has served as a researcher and developer for artist residencies and has worked in various capacities with the Artist Communities Alliance, Studio Rawls, and Sweat Variant, among others.
administrative assistant
© Jarrett Esaw
Sarah Lou Haddad (she/her) is an emerging interdisciplinary artist, curator, and arts administrator born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, working in video, performance, and sculpture. In her artistic practice, Haddad engages her performative body as a specific object, intrinsically tying her work to her identity as a Syrian Jewish woman using its image. Humor and myth become the tools by which Haddad creates a new understanding of the phallic, exploring and challenging who is allowed to possess and create what. As a graduate of Hunter College’s BFA program, Haddad served as President of the Bachelor of Fine Arts Student Organization, where she organized and curated exhibitions such as Lunchbox (2024), Lorem Ipsum (2024), and Nature Of (2023), along with artist talks and student outreach events. She also holds a BA in Art History from Hunter College, where her curatorial research and interest are centered on the support and preservation of media and performance art. During her time as a Curatorial and Archives Intern at The Kitchen, she contributed the article “Performance, Ephemerality, and the Archive” to On Mind, underscoring her dedication to understanding the complexity of performance art and its history.
studio apprentice
Eghosa Danielle Eregie (she/her) is a Dallas native, the daughter of West African immigrants, and one of six siblings. She studied at Columbia University, where she obtained a BA in Architecture with a specialization in Design Processes. During her time in undergrad, she executed several creative roles and projects. As a former Costume & Prop Designer for Columbia’s West African dance team and a Visual Designer, Danielle has honed her talent for visual storytelling and bringing concepts to life. Whether designing products, spaces, or crafting digital graphics, her work reflects a unique blend of technical expertise and artistic flair. Her multidisciplinary art practice aims to create a safe place for her numerous identities through the lens of her inner child by merging sculpting, spatial design, costume, and prop design, with new mediums and constant exploration. Inspired to explore the different ways art can be experienced, she pushes the boundaries of her skills and knowledge to bring her creative visions to life most successfully.