Suport RequestSupport "Cyborg's Mirror: Bodies in Hyperreality" at First Draft at Human Resources LA

Dear friends and supporters,

I’m reaching out to ask for your help in bringing an experimental performance project to life at a work-in-progress showing at First Draft in Los Angeles on November 30th. As a mid-career artist creating choreographic work for over 24 years, mostly without institutional support, this moment feels vital and vulnerable.

Since becoming a working artist mom, the challenges of making my own experimental work have grown, with childcare costs now part of the equation. This project marks my first public performance since the birth of my daughter in 2019, offering a deeply personal reflection on my evolving relationship with my identity—physical, spiritual, and societal—as a middle-aged woman and full-time artist-parent. It explores questions of value, worth, and belonging amidst the shifting cultural expectations and challenges to the human rights of female-identifying individuals in contemporary America.

The Project

This evening of performance includes:

- Cyborg’s Mirror: Bodies in Hyperreality: An interactive choreographic interface created with emergent real-time generative AI in collaboration with creative technologists Mingyong Cheng and Shimmy Boyle. Initially developed with the Data Fluencies Theater Project with support from Brown University’s Ignite Series, this piece explores identity, agency, and embodiment while critically engaging with our contemporary moment where bodies intertwine with algorithmic interfaces.

- Two interrelated movement solos: one which I'm choreographing for myself as the character Ozempic Mommy and another crafted by dancer Jae Neil as the character Scarlet, exploring themes of resilience, body euphoria and collaborative ritual.

- An original score by composer and cherished collaborator Josh Kadish, amplifying the visceral, emotional power the subversive role of the dancing body as it resists, transforms, and redefines embodied experience in the algorithmic age.

- Consulting by stylist Uma Shannon and dramaturge August Henderson.

Why Now?

This is a self-produced project, and while I’m excited to present it at this amazing venue, I cannot do it without your support. Contributions will cover:

- Childcare costs to allow focused rehearsal and creation time.

- Sustainable pay for collaborators, including Josh Kadish, Jae Neil, and Mingyong Cheng.

- Production costs.

- Compensation for my own time in the studio, ensuring this creative research does not represent a financial hardship.

Your Support

Whether you contribute $5 or $500, your support will help me balance the demands of motherhood and art-making.

Your support ensures this work—rooted in experimentation, collaboration, and lived experience—can reach the stage. Thank you for being part of this transformative moment in my life and work.

With gratitude,

Katherine Helen Fisher